OKADA RIDING; CURSE OR BLESSING?

The commercial motorcycle popular know as okada or Achaba is the recent unconventional  means of transportation which is very  famous mostly in commercial cities in Nigeria. In Lagos for instance, okada have ways and tricks of beating traffics and take passengers to their destination on time. Even with the recent law by the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) to stop okada riders from highways, many of them still plying highways on daily basis, defying the safety order by the FRSC to wear helmet and stop plying highways. As it has being entrenched in our system, the order by the FRSC only takes effect for two weeks of the announcement and such announcement as it has been known, is an avenue for security agencies  to make more money by releasing offenders on bail for minimal of 1,000 naira at the spot the offence is being commited. As a result,the okada riders prefered  to defy such order and prefered to pay 1,000 naira if arrested. This has developed over a time to chaos between the okada riders and security agencies as witnessed in Lagos.

But one must not be economical with the truth of what forced not less than seven million Nigeria into this risk job. The harsh condition of how to feed, clothing, rent etc among many factors responsible for the moving of large number of workforce that can be used for the production that can grow the country into okada riding. As government failed either to provide jobs or creating enabling environment for business to thrive, the youth used the okada riding to register their voice that if government failed, they can create jobs for themselves irrespective of what that could cause them and the entire country. In the view of this, indicator shows that Okada riding in another way of perpetrate criminality in the country. In the recent time,not less that 60% crime in the country is being carried out with okada because it is easy to manipulate okada than cars.

Apart from the agile youth that moves into okada business on daily basis, the business also witnessed the accommodation of civil service retirees , artisans and traders. Due to the poor and low-wages we operated in the country, many of the civil servants while serving have little or nothing to save at the end of the month and the pension scheme that suppose to take care of them after retirement has been grossly indicted in corruption by the personnel and political appointees.  The recent pension scam investigated by the Federal House of Assembly is a good example of the claim.

The financial system which suppose to be a respite is another sector that possibly opened a gate for huge prospects for okada riding and shut the gate on self enterprising, skill development and craftsmanship. Even in the face of erratic power supply that grips the country which made many companies relocate to neighbouring Africa countries and consequently the laying off of almost 700,000 workforce, I am sure that there are still some agile youth in this country that can manage and sustain business if they have the opportunity of soft loan. But in a case where  the financial institution blamed is failure on corruption and economic meltdown, which made it impossible to develop small scale business is another way of telling the youth to engage in any job that was accompanied with risk and  future failure.

As a result and because of the risk that attached with okada riding, many people has been killed and many has been rendered hopeless due to various injuries sustained on okada. Statistics shows that almost 20,000 people were on various degrees of injury with almost 5000 that has been rendered to a complete destitute. This statistics does not include the number of the victims that died instantly at the scene of okada’s accident.

Government could in anyway claimed that the importation of okada appropriated funds into the purse of the federation but that must not be a means to compromise youth development. The situation could have better if we have a fabrication plant that  manufacture okada parts here in Nigeria, rathe what we do is that we assemble here and by consequence, we are building other country's economy, we are creating jobs for their youth and leave ours undeveloped. With my technical background,I want to say categorically that we have youth that can manufacture motorcycle and tricycle if there is support from the government and enabling environment.

Craftsmanship is another neglected area which has almost been sacrificed for okada riding. All the youth that suppose to learn carpentry, bricklaying, welding, plumbing etc are now active in riding of okada than any other things. The case is that since there is no stable electricity to work and enabling environment, youth prefered to engage in the work that can provide daily meal for them because the economic hardship in the country has reduced their psych to only "hand  to mouth" jobs . All the countries that is aiming at growing like Nigeria never abandon their craftsmanship because they know that craftsmanship is the key to micro economic development. The point i am making here is that government should stop paying lips services to the transformation agenda it proposed. Let government provide enabling environment for agricultural development and you will see many of this okada people go back to farming. With the research I made, many of them were already tired with the job but expressed fear of lack of livelihood if they live the work. This trend needs to be reversed urgently or else, car will develop fault one day and there will be no mechanic to fix it.