NIGERIA – July is a special month in Nigeria. It is when the heavens open up to release the rain in torrents and expose the hidden shame of our cities. About 60 years ago, a young graduate of the University of Ibadan, John Pepper Clark-Bekederemo, wrote a poem to celebrate the city. They were made to read the poem by their teachers at Ife Anglican Grammar School, Ile-Ife, Who can forget Ibadan?
Ibadan,
Running splash of rust
And gold flung and scattered
Among seven hills like broken
China in the sun.
They don’t know what kind of poem the Muse would inspire someone like Clark to write now when it rains in Lagos and citizens throw their waste into the drainage as if expecting angels to come and help them clear them. The citizens are busy dirtying their own environment, clogging the drains and they blame the government for not clearing the drainages on time.
When Governor Babatunde Raji Fashola was in charge of Lagos, he ordered that every bus and taxi in city must carry waste baskets. That did not stop the citizens from throwing plastic bottles on the streets. Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu is waging the war to keep Lagos clean and clear the drainages, but he is not doing enough to ensure that the citizens comply. We should not wait until one July morning when Lagos would be submerged, not by the rain of July, but by a mountain of plastic bottles and other waste. So far, the rain is fulfilling its promise.
So, tomorrow, when gaily dressed Lagosians and other Nigerians troop out to celebrate the 75th birthday with Princess Abiola Dosunmu, the newly crowned Yeye Oodua of the Source, their greatest worry would be the weather. Dosunmu is one of the giants of the month of July. She was educated in Kano, Lagos and the United Kingdom, got married to a soldier, Major Kunle Elegbede of the Third Marine Commandoes Division, at 21. As a young wife, she visited her husband at the war front during the Nigerian Civil War. At 25, she became a widow when her husband, who survived the war, died in a tragic motor accident in 1972. She was devastated, wore mourning black attires for one year and then decided to re-invent herself. At 75, she has a lot to celebrate.
