Nigeria is a country of
contradictions. The system delights
in robbing Peter to pay Paul. Here, a
large number of people pay for
services that are not provided, and
most of the time, do so under
duress. At the same time, the
system allows the minority to enjoy
the services they do not pay for.
Take the Power Holding Company of
Nigeria for example. While
Nigerians pay outrageous bills for
services that are not provided,
senior officials of the company
enjoy free and stable supply of
electricity.
Though the telecommunications
sector is largely private- sector
driven, the same scenario exists
there. When as an ordinary
Nigerian, you pay for calls that
never go through, you pay for SMS
that are never delivered due to poor
network, or subscribe for a monthly
service that you do not enjoy for
two weeks, some people, especially
members of staff of these
companies and their friends, make
free calls . It’s like the majority
paying to maintain good service
delivery for the minority.
Expectedly, nobody apologises for
rendering poor services and when
they do, nobody compensates or
refunds your money.
Here government is not obliged to
provide social services. But the
citizens are expected to pay their
taxes. It is not unusual to have
classrooms without chairs in some
towns and in others chairs without
tables for pupils or classrooms
without roofs, etc.
If you are driving in a new
environment, don’t be surprised if
you are arrested for breaking
traffic rules even when there are no
sign posts to indicate that a
particular road is a one way. Unlike
the devil that walks about like a
roaring lion looking for who to
devour, here, government officials
hide in corners to see who will fall
into their traps. A government that
cannot afford to erect sign posts to
guide drivers aright does not see
anything wrong in arresting so-called
traffic offenders.
These are some of the reasons why
government is not ashamed to ask
people to pay for certificates of
road worthiness for their cars when
most of the roads in the country are
not worthy.
A few weeks ago, I was driving
along the Lagos /Abeokuta
Expressway [one of the worst roads
in the country]. As bad as this road
is, some people that claimed to be
officials of the Federal Ministry of
Transportation saw nothing wrong in
arresting people for not having their
cars’ certificates of road
worthiness.
I was also stopped by these men and
I gave them my car’s certificate. To
my surprise, I was told the
certificate was obtained from Lagos
State government and because of
that, I needed another one from the
Federal Government. Of course, I
got the national road-worthiness
certificate. And I also paid a fine of
N2, 500 for not having it on me as at
the time I was stopped. In all, I paid
N5, 000 for my worthy car to be
driven on government’s unworthy
road.
The process of paying the money
was tortuous. The road leading to
the MOT office was something else.
If cars could speak, I’m sure my car
would have complained and
protested the ordeal it was made to
go through.
As at today, there is hardly any
major highway in the country that
does not require one form of repair
or the other. Just a few days ago,
my pastor publicly announced on the
pulpit that the church spends
millions of naira every year to
maintain government roads. And the
worst part of it, according to him, is
that you have to apply to government
for permission to help it in doing its
job.
Can someone just tell government to
have mercy on our road-worthy cars
and do major rehabilitation of its
roads? I think we need more car-
worthy roads than we have now. Our
worthy cars surely deserve
something better.


CUllED FROM: blogs.punchng.com/franktalk/2013/05/30/driving-road-worthy-cars-on-nigerias-unworthy-roads/