LAGOS — SCORES of traffic assistants, newly recruited by Bi-Courtney Highway Services Limited, BCHSL, Tuesday, commenced a one-week induction training programme to prepare them for the task of keeping traffic moving while the road is being rebuilt.

Addressing the participants during the training at Isheri, Ogun State,  Chairman of BCHSL, Dr. Bolanle Babalakin, said: “You are about to take on one of the most challenging assignments in Nigeria today as we start building this road. Lagos-Ibadan Expressway is in a very bad shape. If you score seven out of 10 on the road, they’ll call you a failure. The only time you will look good is when you score 100 per cent.”

He noted that great men in the world were those who had turned stumbling blocks into stepping stones, adding: “The greatest attribute is not aptitude but attitude. There are many geniuses that will never fulfill their objectives in life, while there are many averagely talented people, who will get to the top.”

“A man with the right attitude is likely to get to the peak of whatever he is doing much faster. But if a man with aptitude then combines the right attitude, he will be unstoppable, but then, that is a very rare thing.”

“I recollect in 2004, when we started building the MMA2, many people became experts in airport construction. Every morning, when you wake up and open the pages of newspapers, you’ll see headlines like: ‘Bi-Courtney is Doing Nothing on MMA2’; ‘Terminate Bi-Courtney’s Agreement on MMA2’.

But MMA2 has a tunnel, like a big trailer that you drive in, dropping luggage, and drive out and this had not been opened. The newspaper reports were negative, because they were only seeing from outside. They didn’t know that we were building a tunnel, and nobody came to say: ‘Can we see what you’re doing?”, he added.