Barely a month after the Lagos Island NURTW fracas between factions loyal to Sego and Kunle Poly ended on a bitter note leading to loss of lives, another one is brewing between the state union chairman, MC Oluomo and his erstwhile loyalist, Alhaji Azeez Abiola aka Istijabah.
Long before now, the duo of MC Oluomo and Istijabah had been comrades enjoying good working relationship as fellow transport unionists in Lagos. However, that changed when Istijabah was made the chairman of Tricycles Owners and Operators Association of Nigeria (TOOAN), Lagos chapter. The appointment of Istijabah as the Lagos TOOAN chairman, a hitherto arm of the NURTW, didn’t go down well with MC Oluomo.
To start with, Istijabah is a member of Lagos NURTW and a former zonal chairman. He is believed to own more than 5000 tricycles, 5000 commercial buses and more than 1000 trailers and trucks. The man is super rich! How did he become so rich? It’s on the strength of his wealth and reach that compelled the national chairman of the NURTW, Alhaji Tajudeen Baruwa to recognize Istijabah as the head of its affiliate union, TOOAN Lagos. A move that clearly impugned on the vast influence of MC Oluomo as the primus interperes.
MC Oluomo refused to recognize Istijabah as the head of TOOAN Lagos which in turn earned him (Oluomo) an indefinite suspension by the national body of the union. In retaliation, MC Oluomo, yesterday pulled the Lagos NURTW out of the national arm and has gone on to rename it. This move has been greeted with mixed feelings. While some people applauded it, others saw it as a call to open anarchy and doom in Lagos!
To forestall a possible breakdown of law and order, the Lagos Government has banned all transport union activities in the state at the moment. Furthermore, the state government established a technical management committee to oversee the affairs of the union until peace is restored to the troubled body.
While I applaud this deft move by Governor Sanwo-Olu’s administration, I will also urge him to completely rejig the public transport system in Lagos. So long as the use of brute force remains the only means of attaining prominence in Lagos transport system, the nefarious acts of these unionists will go on forever. It’s time to reinvent the wheel and ensure a more refined transport system in Lagos. It’s time to effect the needed change! Agberoism must stop!!!
By Uzogara Tobechukwu