Benin: A City Held Up In Hold-Ups

By Chris Akhabue

It was 5:45am on a Friday morning. It was raining. The cold air was frostly inhibiting as it drizzled intermittently nonstop. The humid air and the cascading droplets of water on the windscreen impaired visibility.

The traffic had began to build up as more vehicles slowed down around the Ramat Park axis, as both sides of the driveway had been taken over and occupied by long trucks waiting to load their consignments at Guinness Plc premises.

Impatient bus and Audi 80 Taxi drivers, blare their horns at the demons of Ikpoba Hill gridlock, as they try futilely to overtake one another at impossible points.

I was early enough to catch up a 7:30 appointment down town, so, I thought.

Like a long parking space, all vehicles where on queue with their headlights on, engines running with indiscernible noise production.

I looked at the dashboard. The car temperature had began to rise. The time was 6:am.

15 minutes wasted on one spot. Buses and taxi drivers were swearing and cursing.

The traffic moved and it was an instant relief, though momentary. Ahead of me, a Notre Dame mini truck got stocked. It jerked and jerked, sputtering in a fit of seizures and, the engine went silent and a brake-down that would further compound the already precarious chaotic traffic situation had just occurred.

The general fit of rage of the moment was gradually becoming infectious. Why won’t this truck move, I said aloud, to myself? I punch the horns.

The mini truck driver jumped out of the heap of metal, ran towards the front of the truck, fiddled with some parts of the engine and dashed back to the driving wheel, all in frantic but propitious efforts to kick-start the ailing vehicle as other commuters cursed and insulted.

I was right behind him, trying without much success to overtake the travailing driver and his broken down truck laden with bags of sachet water. In the euphoria of the overwhelming confusion that engulfed him, he came out to push the over burdened all-metal object.

Few metres away behind, a police patrol van was blaring it’s siren to which no one paid any particular attention. Some few police officers jumped off the police vehicle and ran forward to see the cause of the gridlock. Most times, on this Ikpoba Hill road, around the Ramat Park axis, the cause of the incessant gridlock is never seen or known other than the fact that the road has become inadequate to accommodate the population growth rate.

Gradually, the hold up began to put a palpable line of demarcation between the rich and the poor. One after the other, the middle class caught up in the bedlam began to put off their vehicle engine, ostensibly to save their almost Two Hundred Naira per litre fuel. Only few engines were still running. Some others died on their own accord on account of overheating.

The rain had subsided. The traffic gridlock persisted. Commuters were stranded. Those in vehicles and those who couldn’t find vehicles, all stranded. Despair and frustration visibly on their faces.

This is the routine and tradition in most of the major routes in and around Benin metropolis.

It would be a great deal of surprise to drive through some of the major routes in the city without the usual snag of traffic gridlock.

Places like Ugbowo, Ekenwuan, Ikpoba Hill, Sakponba road, Sapele road, and other major areas with dense population are custodians of Hold-ups. And these roads where the hold ups are prevalent are federal government roads.

Incidentally, Edo State
serve as gateways to the neighbouring Western, Eastern, Southern and the Northern States of the country.

It is therefore sad to note that all the federal roads linking Edo State are in such deplorable conditions.

The federal road from Ikpoba Hill in Ikpoba Okha local government area linking Agbor in Delta State is in deplorable condition as many man hours are wasted daily as a result of traffic gridlock occasioned by bad roads.

The Benin Auchi road is no better. From the Bypass after Aduwawa axis of Benin City to Ehor in Uhunwonde local government area, way down to Ekpoma down to Auchi is a long stretch of bad road you venture to ply only after a serious consultation with God and close family members because of the inherent life threatening dangers pose by the deplorable conditions of the roads which kidnappers, bandits and other men of the underworld are deploying to their advantage.

Residents of Benin City and motorists plying federal highways in Edo State have continued to experience anguish over the deplorable conditions of the roads with no government or any of its relevant agencies paying any attention despite the hues and cries.

The other day, concerned individuals, residents and civil society groups in Benin City could no longer bear the brunt of hardship as a result of Benin-Sapele road connecting Edo and Delta states that has become a death trap to motorists plying the highway. They resorted to peaceful protest which lasted almost two weeks to draw the attention of federal and Edo state governments to the plight of motorists and other commuters as a result of the bad condition of the road.

As a result, Edo State government has mobilise for the immediate palliative measure to fix the affected portions of the road.

The Benin-Agbor Highway in Ikpoba Okha local government area connecting Edo to the eastern part of the country is also in deplorable condition.

Presently the Benin – Ekpoma federal highway is completely blocked by protesting youths of the senatorial district as result of the bad condition of the road which has hindered free véhiculer movement and consequently hightened the anguish and pains of residents of the area.

The Godwin Obaseki’s administration has done so much in the area of road constructions and rehabilitation and a lot of efforts has also gone into traffic management through Edo State Traffic Management Agency that has relentlessly managed and controlled traffic situation in the metropolis.

Presently, it is safe to conclude as it were, that all the federal roads leading into Benin and out are in dire need of repair as they have become not motorable any longer and therefore in dire need of urgent government attention.

Be that as it were, there is the urgent need for the Edo State and the federal government to find an enduring solution to mitigate incidences of traffic gridlock by expanding existing infrastructure and building bridges where necessary so as to ease the pressure and anguish residents go through daily in their efforts to erk out a living.

It is arguably true therefore that Benin city is in dire need of flyover from Ikpoba Hill to Sakponba Road area and other city centres so as to reduce the traffic congestion as a result of vehicular movement from the Eastern parts of the country from the Agbor Park axis of Ikpoba Okha and also from the traffic flowing in from the Northern States and from the middle belt through Aduwawa of Uhumwode local government area of the state so as to ease the stress and trauma residents go through daily as a result of bad federal government roads in the state.