^^^ You are missing the point, the guys do not live on the dumpsite but they earn their living by scavenging from a dumpsite in Lagos. I can't understand why you are inferring that the documentary suggests that Lagos is dumpsite

PLEASE DRY YOUR EYES !!!!!
True they live in the dumps , but in essence what they are doing is a from of recycling , if the Governement had any sense at all they'd make it an industry and employ people to work in recycling factories . These people are actually making a living , loving it and getting on with life.
i am just concerned about health and safety issues for these people.
I think these people (scavengers or whatever they call themselves)are absolutely amazing , they have managed to zone out the difficulties, the environment , the ups and downs of what they do .
I just wish i had half their zeal and determination.

Re: Is This Nigeria? I Was Moved To Tears By These Pictures
« #109 on: Today at 01:25:28 AM »  

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It dodoesn'took like Nigeria, and I dndenthin they live there.

and so what niggu dis looks lik every other thirld world country, 80 pepercentf the world lives lik this.

see pic niggu

thanks alot @sjeezy8 for the pictures of slums from other dedeveloping country ,like china ,south Africa, japan and the rest . the Bbc have finished with India now is nigeria waste they are after . it all about  recycling . Recycling is carry out world wide , the only differents the method  used

I am not inferring anything, ok? - if your argument is okay, then the title should have been - life in a dump site in Lagos - and not "Lagos" as the title of the documentary is -

wait until they show you Makoko in the next episode and you will see what BBC is out to achieve.

That is the dumpsite along Oworonshoki expressway shortly after Berger, behind Ojota. All countries have dumpsites now so what's all these about?
All those people are people we used to call kongis when I was a kid. What they do is simply comb dirts for useful element that can still be made use of. There's nothing bad in that abeg. The motive behind it will soon be known

@labiyemmy:

I am not inferring anything, ok? - if your argument is okay, then the title should have been - life in a dump site in Lagos - and not "Lagos" as the title of the documentary is -

wait until they show you Makoko in the next episode and you will see what BBC is out to achieve.

So does any of the things shown in the documentary not happen in Lagos? Is it not the life millions of Lagosians live?

Kobojunkie:

@Iceblue, this is a life lesson for all.

Rather than focus on what the next man thinks of you and painting a FALSE picture, focus more on IMPROVING Yourself and the people will see it. Singapore did it, China has done it and is still working hard at it. Iraq is doing it, even Mexico is working on it. Nigeria ought be doing that rather than worrying about which side of the field foreign media chooses to focus on. We cannot continue to make excuses every time someone decides to focus on a particular area and not the one we would prepare they do. You cannot go around controlling what people choose to focus on, but you can work on improving the country so that they have nothing of what you do dnot like, to focus on.

Thank you very much for this post.  Nigerians cry foul and whenever they see bad image of the country on news.  the so called western media you think is only showing the bad side are international media houses, their local media houses takes care of the shi.ts in their countries, so they don't have time to compete with them since they are playing on the international stage.  If you don't like what they are doing why not tell your government to apply the Iran system where they have Press TV also airing every negative news from the west to the whole world and the Iranians.

@labiyemmy:

Naijababe

Noone is advocating that Ikoyi and VI be shown - the point is - showing a dump site and making it seem like the life in Lagos is a complete false hood, a dumpsite is not Lagos, can not be Lagos and it should be seen as what it is, a mere dump site - a mere dump site in America does not represent what America is.

The BBC program did not imply that the dumpsite represents ALL of Lagos and I doubt any one with common sense would see it that way either. Just like no one would see a dumpsite in NY, London or Paris and assume that it makes up the city neither would anyone think so about Lagos. If you are really worried about other people's thoughts on the program then take time to find out instead of assuming you know what they think.

hmmmmmmmmmm

we can use thoose thing to produce export goods

agitator:

Thank you very much for this post. Nigerians cry foul and whenever they see bad image of the country on news. the so called western media you think is only showing the bad side are[size=14pt] international media houses, [/size] their [size=14pt]local media houses [/size] takes care of the shi.ts in their countries, so they don't have time to compete with them since they are playing on the international stage. If you don't like what they are doing why not tell your government to apply the Iran system where they have Press TV also airing every negative news from the west to the whole world and the Iranians.

Thank you!!! I keep wondering what world people who claim the same channels do not show pictures of slums in cities like Chicago, NY, Los Angeles, live. I see those every freaking day. Disclaimer: These slums do not compare to what we see in places like Nigeria, Brazil, China, or even india.

Yet, I can say for a fact that China, Brazil, and India are trying to clean up and lift their own people. What is Nigeria doing? NOTHING STILL.

I suggest we form a new blogsphere from nairaland for only the people worth discussing issues with and properly eliminating ignorant people from it.

How can anybody who is a Nigerian not be entirely grateful to the BBC (who had no business in the first place to show us the reality facing us as a people and how we can move ourselves forward) only for some ignorant people to talk trash without thinking.

This pictures doesnt truly represent the country Nigeria, it is clear that the pictures were specifically to make a point, "d bad side of Nigeria", but good people of Nigeria, we know our dear nation aint this bad, av got hopes in this country and i sure do believe that some day Nigeria will stand tall, and rise above all d bad belle people.

Thank you!!! I keep wondering what world people who claim the same channels do not show pictures of slums in cities like Chicago, NY, Los Angeles, live. I see those every freaking day. Disclaimer: These slums do not compare to what we see in places like Nigeria, Brazil, China, or even india.

Yet, I can say for a fact that China, Brazil, and India are trying to clean up and lift their own people. What is Nigeria doing? NOTHING STILL.

Thank you very much, I 'm personally grateful to Channel 4 for Lagos Airport. Maybe this kind of programmes will force the hand of our otherwise shameless leaders

Its HIGH time we stopped Western media Houses;especially BBC from deceiving us.The Lagos that I know currently is no longer what is being depicted in the ill gotten Documentary.We are interested in the 'now' and let us move ahead. If they are short of programmes they could come and seek my service ,I'll get them better programmes and not this spurious rubbish being shown on TV.
RUBBISH!

How can this be WELCOME to Nigeria when all they did was go to a dump site and take pics. In UK don't they  re-cycle their waste too. the difference is that they use machines and not people. No matter how bad our country is we should not join others to paint a negative FALSE picture. they will never welcome u into their country after destroying ur own countries image

naijababe:

Thank you very much, I 'm personally grateful to Channel 4 for Lagos Airport. Maybe this kind of programmes will force the hand of our otherwise shameless leaders

I doubt the so called leaders will even see it, let alone be moved to act. I have seen a lot of these kind of documentaries to know that these leaders are rarely moved by much else but money and power.

Can our nigerians in diaspora do us a necessary favour by taking photos of slums and the likes in these european countries and posting them around or at least publish their own bad side?  . Haba!

Yes, Nigeria is a challenging place and we have many problems. Yes, poverty is evident, but is this the face of Lagos or even Nigeria??

These western media houses are simply cruel in their analyses and reporting.  RUBBISH!

Can our nigerians in diaspora do us a necessary favour by taking photos of slums and the likes in these european countries and posting them around or at least publish their own bad side?  . Haba!

Yes, Nigeria is a challenging place and we have many problems. Yes, poverty is evident, but is this the face of Lagos or even Nigeria?? . Why do they always love painting Nigeria like this?

These western media houses are simply cruel in their analyses and reporting.  RUBBISH!

Well a dumpsite is not Lagos and will never be a Lagos. So in that sense you can say that the title of the documentary is very misleading.
But if Western viewers are continually exposed to horrific pictures of Nigeria without context, then it is no surprise if they have a negative but false impression of the country

larimo:

Can our nigerians in diaspora do us a necessary favour by taking photos of slums and the likes in these european countries and posting them around or at least publish their own bad side? . Haba!

Yes, Nigeria is a challenging place and we have many problems. Yes, poverty is evident, but is this the face of Lagos or even Nigeria??

These western media houses are simply cruel in their analyses and reporting. RUBBISH!

Go to Google . . . . Type <CityNAME> Slums , and you will get THOUSANDS of pictures of slums in the cities you desire to see. Ignorance is not going to help here. Leave your fake STUCK UP behind under your bed and learn to accept the reality of your fellow men is also worth addressing.

i still love nigeria, despite all, nija for life , yes but we all have to put our heads 2geda and find a solution so that our children and grandchildren will have a future

Kobojunkie:

Go to Google  . . . .  Type <CityNAME> Slums , and you will get THOUSANDS of pictures of slums in the cities you desire to see. Ignorance is not going to help here. Leave your fake STUCK UP behind under your bed and learn to accept the reality of your fellow men is also worth addressing.

No mind the Maga, we must accept the bitter truth and take steps to rectify our deficiencies not complain about how others perceive us. the negative or positive way other people perceive you depends on how you make yourself out to be. Change yourself ad change the perceptions.  

Oyinbo man wey shoot the movie, puts it best himself,

Welcome to Lagos - it'll defy your expectations

Post categories: bbc two, welcome to lagos

Will Anderson Will Anderson | 13:18 UK time, Thursday, 15 April 2010

When my friend rang to ask me out for a drink, I was already in Heathrow Terminal 5. "I'm not going to be around for the next four months or so," I told him. "I'm going to Lagos."

His immediate reaction - "Why? What's wrong? Are you in trouble? Is it the police?" - was typical. Nigeria, and Lagos in particular, seems to have a terrible reputation in Britain.

Everyone thinks of it as a noisy, dirty, dangerous city, probably because all we ever hear about it on the news is the corruption, religious violence, and dodgy email scams. I was convinced there was more to it than that, which is why four of us were heading out there for such a long period of time.

Our insurers had insisted that we were met at the airport by a team of armed police men, who would escort us and all our expensive filming equipment safely to our hotel. I have never been so embarrassed in my life.

As our convoy sped through town, sirens wailing, blue lights flashing, it seemed to me that this was by far the best way to advertise our arrival to all the criminals in the city.

The next day, feeling sheepish, we dispensed with all policemen, armed guards and security advice, and decided to go it alone.

We were heading for the ghettos and slums, which make up three quarters of Lagos, to find strong characters who could would let us into their lives, and present them to an audience in the UK. We had no idea what to expect or how we'd be received.

First stop was the city's main dump site, Olusosun. This definitely isn't on the tourist trail of Lagos, but then Lagos doesn't have much of a tourist industry at the moment. Some 5,000 people work on the dump, and we were immediately struck by how organised and efficient everything was.

As well as all the scavengers working behind the dump trucks, grabbing anything and everything they could to re-sell to the re-processing factories, there were shops, bars, restaurants, a mosque, a barbers, and even a cinema.

100413_dumpscavengers_600.jpg

The longer we hung out on the dump (it very soon became one of our favourite places to film, because the people were all so friendly there) the more astonishing it became. It turned out that the scavengers even had their own form of democratically elected chairman, who sorted out any arguments or disagreements.

The dump became symbolic of everything we were trying to achieve in the films. It looks at first sight like a rough, lawless, dangerous place, and most people in this country will be horrified to see people working there.

But in actual fact, through the eyes of the people who actually DO work there, it's a well-organised place where there's good money to be earned. Decent, honest people choose to work there, preferring a life of grime to a life of crime. Some of them are university graduates.

They are proud of the fact that they earn an honest living, and are making a better life for themselves and their families through sheer determination and hard work.

We realised the scavengers were people to be admired rather than pitied, and it changed our whole perspective on the place. They didn't feel sorry for themselves, so why should we feel sorry for them? We decided that the films should celebrate their resourcefulness, and challenge our audience's views of what poverty is.

After the dump we went to Makoko, an extraordinary floating slum, where everyone travels round in boats. Some people call it Lagos's version of Venice.

Programme two's star Mr Chubbey outside his home on the floating slum of Makoko

There's 100,000 people living on houses built on stilts, and after a week or so of drifting around in boats, stopping at people's houses and talking to them, we stumbled across Mr Chubbey, who went on to become the star of programme two.

He has 18 children to look after, and is always on the look out for some scheme or another which will help him make more money. He's like a character from Only Fools And Horses, buying selling, wheeling and dealing, doing dodgy deals and getting by on his charm and his luck. All that's missing is the camel skin coat.

The last film is set on a beach right in the heart of the swankiest part of town. It sounds idyllic - white sands, clear blue Atlantic waters, baking hot sunny days - and in many ways it is.

But it is also home to 1,000 or so squatters, who have built homes on the sand because they have nowhere else to go. After a couple of trips, walking along the sands, explaining what we were doing to the inquisitive children, we met Esther, a sparky, intelligent, beautiful young woman who had been staying on the beach for the last six years.

She lived with her husband Segun in a little house which they had built themselves out of scrap wood, cardboard and old tarpaulins. It probably cost them about £80.

Esther, the star of programme three, outside her house on the slum on the beach

But when Esther and her husband started to have problems in their marriage, and it looked like they were going to split up, they used to have terrible arguments about who was going to get the house - every bit as vicious as they would be if they were living in a mansion in Beverley Hills.

We realised then that all our characters, wherever they lived, however extreme their working environment, went through all of the same things which we do in the West - love, heartbreak, marriages, births, deaths etc. It's just that they live on a different scale to us, in the slums of the fastest growing city in the world, and with no money. This forces them to be more resourceful, energetic, and optimistic than most people in the West.

And yes, they may be terribly poor, but that doesn't stop them being human and, if the films have succeeded, then I hope they've succeeded in showing that.

Will Anderson is the series producer of Welcome To Lagos. Welcome To Lagos is a three-part series on BBC Two, Thursdays at 9pm, from 15 -29 April.The first episode is now available on the iPlayer

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/tv/2010/04/welcome-to-lagos-itll-defy-you.shtml

Vocal Slender, my man.

No matter how oversensitized the Documentary maybe, focus less on that and more on the fact that the whole Country of Nigeria needs major reshaping.

You sit and argue how thats not a true representation of LAGOS, but the truth doesnt hide.

The Title of the Documentary isn't really right for it.

Thank You @Mystical - thats the point I have been making which is hard to see for some.

Still waiting for NTA/AIT to show the scavengers in America and in Europe and their dump sites.

About the fire and stuff? Usually - dump sites like that gets burnt regularly - this is why I wonder the whole essence of the documentary - even the one close to Isolo Jakande Estate Bridge - gets burnit regularyly - why will they call fire brigade to quench a fire delibarately started to burn the rubbish?

^^
I am surprised that some people here have not grasped that simple fact. By having such a title and then showing life in a refuse dump they are making an implicit connection between the two.
Being VERY PATRONISING about the very human qualities of those that choose to make a living recycling items in the refuse dump in no way compensates for the misleading title.

mystikal:

The Title of the Documentary isn't really right for it.

There are 3 parts to the documentary, you have just seen the ONE, still part of Lagos. It is an appropriate title from what I have read so far. Unless you expect the documentary to show ONLY the side of lagos you are used to focusing on. The 5000 people who live in the dumps also deserve air time, they are Lagosians, or aren't they?

I am surprised that some people are vigorously commenting on a programme they havent seen. Oh gosh!