BY Jonah Nwokpoku

General Manager, Uber Nigeria, Ebi Atawodi has said that the taxi service, Uber will create more jobs and decongest Lagos when the service has achieved maximum uptake within the city. She stated this during a press briefing in Lagos last week. According to her, the Uber service is pushing for fewer cars on the road globally using the technology while increasing utilisation and efficiency.

Ebi said Uber has grown in Lagos considerably since launch six months ago with demand exceeding 100 per cent.“Uber brings job creation, financial opportunity, less congestion, safety, price transparency and innovation into Nigeria. And with services like Uberpool, driving utilisation by 72 per cent, the climate is helped with fewer emissions including less traffic on the road,” she said.

“It’s really about empowering small business owners. This is because, as a driver, you are doing a couple of things. In this instance, you don’t have to wait for hours waiting for that next trip. With Uber, they just sit in their cars and the job comes to them. This means that we are removing congestion, traffic, and time wasted on traffic. So the beauty is that as a driver, you spend more time working and earning money as opposed to sitting and waiting for a trip,” she added.

She further said that it is also about creating a higher level of standard and transparency in the industry, because with technology like Uber, the standard is uniform and the experience is the same and seamless. Uber, a technology company that connects riders with drivers through a smartphone application – recently launched in Lagos as a reliable and flexible alternative to urban transportation in the city.

Uber rides have a GPS tracking system which sees where the rider is on the map, making pickup more efficient than alternate means of transportation. Riders also have access to a live GPS-enabled map throughout their journey and can share this with a third party – such as family, partners or friends – who can track their progress to their destination.