Mpape’s kings of the roads

This hilly, overpopulated suburb of the FCT plays host to a rising population of okada riders, who have mastered all the nooks and crannies of the area. As early as 4:30 am, they begin to trickle out from their slums and various other abodes. Shortly afterwards, they are joined by their fellows seeping in from […]

This hilly, overpopulated suburb of the FCT plays host to a rising population of okada riders, who have mastered all the nooks and crannies of the area.
As early as 4:30 am, they begin to trickle out from their slums and various other abodes. Shortly afterwards, they are joined by their fellows seeping in from neighbouring satellite towns.
Together, they rake the nooks and slums of the hilly settlement for the daylong commuter-service business, picking passengers from all the wards to EcoBank and PW.
Between 5:00 am and 7:00 am, their population builds up to a couple of thousands, flooding the two main streets of the densely populated satellite town – Area I/Extra Care-EcoBank Road and Berger Quarry Road, (both roads meeting at EcoBank) like a vast swarm of locusts descending on a cereal farm.
They mass-commute passengers from these points on the two-lane snaky road halfway down hill to the PW terminus, buzzing along like a migrant colony of bees.
Along this one kilometre distance, these motorcycles mix up with the long chain of cars, buses and trucks, which they engulf at sections of the road, to produce a view of a meandering mass of assorted objects flowing downhill between 5:00 am and 11:00 am, when the hilltop community disgorges about half of its population on the city centre and other locations of the Federal Capital Territory; or uphill between 4:00 pm and 9:00 pm, when it gorges this population back to its bowl.
Mpape is generally believed to harbour the densest population of mass commuter-service motorcycles called Okada, Achaba, Going or Kabu-kabu, in spite of the acclaimed popularity or notoriety of Nyanya/Mararaba. All stakeholders in the Okada operation there have not agreed on the exact population of these motorcycles.
The district head of the densely inhabited settlement, Alhaji Abubakar Ibrahim Gimba, puts their population at about 4,000. The Okada riders population is estimated to be 7,000 while officials of the Okada riders union say they are in the region of 10, 000, including, according to them, the 2,000 who go there from Kubwa, Dutsen Alhaji and Nyanya/Mararaba for their daily business every morning, and depart in the evening.
An anonymous police sergeant charges: “Did I hear you say Mpape is city of Okada? You are underestimating their population here. Mpape is the state of Okada.”
The striking features of the Mpape Okada riders, in comparison, or contrast, to their fellows at Mararaba and other thickly-populated satellite towns of FCT include their huge population, location of operation and style of operation.
Generally accepted and tolerated as a ‘necessary evil’, motorcycle means of transportation is relied upon for mass-commuting Nigerians in cities, townships and the larger percentage of rural dwellings.
The commercial motorcyclists operation at Mpape, however, according to law enforcement agents and commuters there, showcases the myriad of scary problems blighting the mass transit system in Nigeria.
“Mpape is witnessing an invasion by a huge Okada army,” Mr. Richie Obasi, a federal civil servant residing at the satellite town commented. “Their high population may not be unconnected with the ban on their operation in the main bowl of the capital city and other densely populated cities of the North, like Kano and Kaduna. When they were banned there, they flooded the FCT, with the highly populated satellite towns as their targets for business.
“Their huge population here is no more abnormal to every Mpape resident. What may be abnormal is when we wake up on a morning to see just half of their population competing to carry the huge population of workers and traders flooding out every day. Among the satellite towns, apart from Nyanya/Mararaba/Karu axis, Mpape is the most populated because of its proximity to the city, and the highest percentage of this population must rely on these guys to transport them to various locations .This should explain why they are so many here.”
Mr. John Haruna, a foreman at a construction site at Mpape, said that “their population frightens us, but we have learnt to live with it, there is nothing we can do about it,” adding: “The only thing you can do when an Okada man is reckless while carrying you, is to warn him to be careful or tell him to drop you, but don’t fight him because if you do, you may regret it.
“If you fight him, or even provoke him, his counterparts, most of who are drug addicts, will unite to fight you.
“They operate like bees. When a bee disturbs your peace by buzzing around you, it expects you to ignore it. If you try to drive it away with a wave of the hand, it strikes with a sting, and it will even invite its sisters to help in fighting you. They love their own. When an Okada man trifles with your safety as his passenger, or he violates your right as his fellow road user, he expects you to ignore him. If you complain and, in the process, abuse him, he hurls abuses at you. If you fight him, they will assemble around you and beat you, or smash the windscreen of your car or damage your car and nothing will happen.
“Before you call a law enforcement agent, all of them would have fled. With their huge population in Mpape, the situation is even more disturbing.”
According to Moses Effiong, a taxi driver plying the Mpape-Berger-Area I route, the Okada men “actually rule the roads here because they are so many.”
“They know the roads very well, and most times, other motorists have to adjust to their style of operation, not the other way round.”
On the reason why the Okada operators are many in Mpape, an operator, Musa Isa, who hails from Jigawa State, said: “I cannot tell you why we are emotionally attached to Mpape. I cannot tell you we love Mpape or otherwise. I can only say that in spite of the harassment meted out to us by law enforcement agents, most of us find it cheap residing here, and those of us who come here every day for business, make brisk business because of the enormous population of the residents going out and returning every day.
“Of course, our large population can be attributed to unemployment. The Okada business is a veritable source of employment for the majority of the youth and even the middle-aged in many parts of Nigeria. Our population is large at Mpape because the population of our customers is also large here.”
Another operator, Aminu Isa, did not want to brood over their population at Mpape or the troubles inherent in living there, urging the “government to make employment available to us so that we can leave this business for good.”
Abubakar Aliyu, another Okada rider, from Taura Local Government Area of Jigawa State, said: “I am doing this Okada business as a last resort because of the high risk involved in it. You could collide with a car, bus, tipper or trailer, or even your fellow Okada rider.
“This motorcycle I am riding is my own, but because the Okada business is not as lucrative as it used to be, I have not saved up to N1, 000, in spite of the fact that I have been doing this business for three months. I am barely able to feed my family in Mpape where we are too many.”
Anas Abubakar, however, recounted his ordeal with the police and alleged: “They are not fair to us at all. They usually carry out regular raids and arrest us for no crime. I once paid up to N10, 000 to bail myself. This is our main problem here.”
Speaking, Mr. Mark Ihenu, the Vice Chairman of the Mpape Okada Riders Union, said: “Our problem here is that of roads. The roads the government built since 1982 have not been rehabilitated. The roads used by motorists are the ones used by kura people (cart pushers), mai ruwa people (water vendors), wheelbarrow pushers and my members – the Okada operators. And the roads are not wide enough to contain the vehicles. This is why you see this congestion. It is not caused by the population of my members alone. This is why a lot of road accidents involving my members happen.”
He argued that “relationship between us, Police and Road Safety personnel has been very pleasant,” adding: “They don’t arrest my members for no just cause.”
He justified the huge population of his members in Mpape, saying: “Without this population of Okada in Mpape, people would have been in trouble. Consider this situation: there is a very long traffic jam on this very terrible narrow road, which is the only one leading you out to the express road, and it is getting late for you for a serious business you must transact at a destination in the other parts of the FCT. What do you do? You must resort to Okada to convey you to any point where you can find any other vehicle to facilitate your journey to your destination on time. Thousands of people face this challenge everyday in Mpape. This is why we are so many here in order to satisfy the transportation need of people.”
According to him, it is not possible to give the exact number of Okada riders in Mpape because about 2,000 of them come from outside every day, adding: “Some may go today and may not come back. Others may come in today and remain, which makes it impossible for us to fix an exact number. But more than 10, 000 operate in Mpape daily.”
Hudu Ibrahim, the official in charge of internal policing of the Mpape Okada Union, said: “Any of our members who commits any crime, or violates road traffic rules, or is involved in an accident where he is at fault, we arrest him and hand him over to the police or Road Safety officials. We don’t just let our members operate without discipline.”
Alhaji Gimba said he was not safe from what everyone described as the perilous operations of Okada riders in his domain and their cantankerous attitudes.
He said: “Sometimes, they brush my car, and when I complain, they hurl abuses at me, but I excuse them for that because they could be ignorant of the person they are abusing. This is the wisest thing to do, because, very often, when it is disclosed to them later that it was me they abused, they would come to the palace and apologise, and I forgive them, but also admonish them to cultivate good attitudes. The offences and crimes they may be committing are for the police and Road Safety officials to handle.
“Their population here may not exceed 4, 000,” the royal father maintained, adding that he treats them with wisdom as a substantial part of the population of his domain.
The Divisional Police Officer of Mpape (Amina B. Garba) referred our reporter to the FCT Police Command PPRO for comment, but an anonymous police official there said: “Okada operators are our nightmare. Mpape is the state of Okada and most of them are on drugs and they are criminals. They use their motorcycles to snatch handbags and handsets.”
The officer in charge of the Federal Road Safety Corps outpost at Mpape would not even introduce himself for “lack of authority to speak without clearance” from his Wuse Zone 7 headquarters. But a Road Safety official who hazarded a comment on condition of anonymity said: “Mpape is daily under attack by large armies of Okada riders and road accidents involving them are a common occurence. But we have been trying our best to surmount the challenges posed by their leg-breaking operations. This is the much I can tell before you go to Zone 7.”
Essentially, however, whether it is 10, 000, 7, 000, 5, 000, 4, 000, or whatever their population strength is, the Mpape commercial motorcyclists rule the roads.