By Muyiwa Adetiba

It was one of those invitations you couldn’t but honour. It was the engagement of a friend’s child.He is not just a friend. He is more. He is someone whose opinion I cherish because he will say it the way he sees it without mincing words.Our paths crossed when I was twelve and he was thirteen and have remained interwoven since then.

I knew about the lady by his side long before she became his wife and the mother of his children. I knew his childrenas they were being delivered into the world including the one whose engagement and wedding invitations lay on the table.Invitations that haunted me with their presence.

Ordinarily, attending the functions should be a joy and something to look forward to except that I had shut down on social gatherings since Covid19 -my children say Covid19 is just a convenient excuse since I started shutting down on outings long before Covid19 anyway. But its hardly a tenable reason to give this kind of friend – there is no tenable excuse to give a close friend and brother for skipping his son’s engagement. But every time I saw those cards my heartbeatquickened to the point of palpitation. Yet, I knew the days would pass. Somehow.

It didn’t help that the venue for the engagement was Akute in Ogun State. I had heard of the place but never had cause to go there. And in my current semi-reclusive state, I hesitate to go to places I have long been to for fear of changed landmarks.Places I have never visited just fill me with a kind of trepidation which is more than the usual fear of the unknown.

The almighty Google map didn’t help as the names of places and streets that came up were unfamiliar to me. I feared what a wrong turning would mean. Images of police checkpoints at every unsuspecting corner; of Local Government ‘Officials’ lurking around to catch ‘unwise’ motorists taking a newly created ‘one-way’; of undulating roads of craters and gullies that would sometimes lead to cul-de-sacs flashed through my mind. I asked my driver if he knew the way to Akute. He said he had heard of the name but had no idea how to get there. I sighed.

Then some three days to the time, another childhood friend called to say an air-conditioned bus was being arranged for Akute. It would take off in Ikeja. Was I interested? It was God sent. I started looking forward to the trip knowing that the bus would be peopled by friends and classmates some of whom I hadn’t seen for a while; knowing the trip would be full of jokes and banters all the way.

But more importantly, knowing I had become a passenger and not a pathfinder. I was in an upbeat mood as we passed placesI knew but had not passed through for a while. We passed Ogba industrial Estate. Wide and well tarred, the road was better than I remember it. Acme Road brought some fond memories. Alhaji Jakande’s press where I printed a weekly magazine for a while, was around the place.

Ojodu Road had even fonder memories. I had an office off the road some three decades ago. Try as I could, I couldn’t locate the turning to where Prime People Magazine was housed in the late 80s. To think I drove on that road everyday for a couple of years! The sheer concentration of people and shops had overtaken the once sleepy road of the 80s.As we passed Ojodu Berger into Alagbole, the scenery changed imperceptibly but surely.

It looked slightly rural. But It did not have the freshness and space of a rural area. Yet, it had its poverty. It was inescapable as it stared you in the face wherever you looked – the dusty roads, the faded wears, the vacant looks, the disheveled mien- all led to a general aura of despair. The shops and stalls were tiny and tightly compressed together – yet you had the feeling that people worked, lived and slept in those cubicles.

The congested markets spilled into the streets in places. As we moved inland, we felt more than poverty. We felt neglect as we saw people who were trying hard to survive. Our brothers and sisters from the northern part of the country were seen in clusters. Places that looked like ‘home’ to them were not more than sheds for goats or cattle. This caused someone in the bus to pass a comment on the abysmal condition. Another retorted that it was probably better than where they were coming from and that this was their kind of ‘Japa’. Down south, they would find jobs however menial. Up north, it would be nothing but crime.

To say the roads were tortuous is an understatement. We got to a point where the road divided into two. More than once, I thanked God that I didn’t have my vehicle on the road. It is hard to believe that this area has a Local Government Councilor. Or thatit has representatives in the two Legislative Chambers. These people come from among them. Next year, these representatives would rely on their votes.

The current Governor would also rely on their votes. It is a shame really because what one sees is an absence of governance. It is not in Akute alone. It is in almost every Ogun State town that spills into Lagos. Those who think the problem is in Aso Rock alone should take a look at Ogun State. Most of the inner roads around Shagamu, a major city in Ogun State, are deplorable.

Ogun State serves as the poultry basket for Lagos yet most of poultry farms are yet to be connected to the grid. The bad roads and the current cost of diesel take their toll on production costs. Yet government knows how to collect taxes from them.The politicians know how to sweet talk them when they want votes.

My trip to Akute was an experience worth having – the journey back was even more tortuous as workers had closed and the tiny roads were clogged with cars and motorcycles. But that is a story for another day. Living in the low density areas of Lagos and Abuja will not give one an idea of how rough life is for those who claim to live in the ‘city’ but who actually live in the satellite towns around the State and Federal capitals. It does not give us an idea of how insensitive and callous our political leaders are to their plight. The electoral cycle is here again telling us that if we want a change in the way we are being treated, we must vote for a change.