Hot Air

While I was standing in the queue waiting to check in for my Enugu-Lagos flight, I was informed of a delay of 2 hours by a suave 6.2 foot gentleman and his bemused American companion. The lightness of the moment was interrupted by a fracas at the Air Arik counter. Deep voices resonated across the small departures hall. When the reasonable request was made that we be checked in, in order to escape the debilitating heat, the refusal was countered with a shouting match that ranged from accusations (‘you treat us like animals’), incredulity (‘who is the man, what is his position? what is his authority?!’) and threats (‘my fare pays your job; you can lose your job’). We were checked in but when I commended my compatriots on their intervention, my tall neighbour informed me that the check-in clerk was on his way anyway. The scene was unnecessary.

Enugu is an attractive city; hilly and green currently undergoing mass road infrastructure upgrades. The layout is conventional with many squares punctuating its gridiron monotony with large heroic figures celebrating independence and less reassuringly…military rule. The military is very present in Enugu; their base is one of the first things you see on the way from the airport. They are present at the entrance to the University, the airport and at strategic points around the city. Their guns and uniforms echo the unease one feels when observing the statues of steel featuring guns, knives and soldiers. My Igbo colleagues shudder at the associations; the dread experienced under military rule was not that long ago.

In the shadow of showy public sculptural displays, the real Enugu reveals itself. I am told the East is known for its traders and this is evident. Streets are lined with small business at a relentless density, some with shop fronts not more that two meters wide. Computer dealers, business centres, artists, artisans play their wares and trade with a busy intensity that defies the hot sun. Tailors and dressmakers are in abundance. Their products are modelled on the street where brightly clad ladies delicately balancing baskets on their heads pass men wearing intricately lace detailed West African suits. I was presented with a beautiful suit tailored in a day, immaculately made, a gift that bears testimony to an inherent creativity, craftsmanship and propensity for hard work. This is what builds the city, this quiet tenacity and focus. No need to shout.

Fragments

In the 48 hours spent hosted by my gracious colleagues from University of Lagos, I saw men carrying sewing machines on their heads, others patiently pushing large metal trolleys containing water containers, with vendors selling fuel in an oil rich country at double the commercial rate while vehicles patiently line up at service stations in this twisted irony of global economics. Highways are mobile shopping malls, vendors criss-cross the somnolent traffic with agile elegance, balancing newspapers/ airtime vouchers/plastic placemats/sewing kits etc while negotiating terms of trade.

Whilst crossing a number of bridges between the mainland and the islands that form the Southern part of this city. I snapped billboards celebrating the pending FIFA World Cup only to find upon my return, debilitating poverty displayed in makeshift stilt structures on the Lagoon in between floating logs in administered rows. Slums contrast with affluent gated estates, access to which is curtailed by potholes and traffic. Negotiating 10 kms in Lagos can take you two hours despite the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system that criss-crosses this megolopolis. Additional public transport is provided by motorised rickshaws, motorbikes and motor vehicles of varying sizes and functions. I am not unfamiliar with urban poverty, nor with the phenomenon of the mega-city, but Lagos is something else entirely.

As planners we are trained to think holistically. What distinguishes us is the ability to see the bigger picture, makes sense of the synergies that allow a city to function effectively. A modestly arrogant expectation is the anticipation of a total understanding of the city: what makes it tick, what are the forces that lead to ongoing change, the spatial configurations and logic, the underlying energies? Lagos defies all of that. It denies one the satisfaction of prediction and overall urban insight. It allows only fragments. This extends to living in the city I believe. It is quite possible to live in Lagos with the detachment that separates one from public life in the city. A driver takes you to work while you negotiate business deals on your mobile phone. Your office is cooled and powered by a generator to avoid the constant power cuts (Nigeria produces one eight of the electricity South Africa produces....for a population of 150 million, almost four times the size of South Africa's population) which also powers the laptop, digitally connected by a 3G modem. You return to your home behind the high walls that shields you from the chaotic surroundings. The 8 pm flight takes you to London/Johannesburg/Accra/Frankfurt/New York.... your check-in procedure smoothed by the self-employed tout that accelerates your boarding and customs clearance for as little as US $10.

My own experience is not dissimilar as my astronomical hotel bill and reduced stash of US dollars attest. As an urbanist, I find this strangely tragic however. Did I miss out on the Lagos experience, or do these fragments merely comprise a different kind of urban condition, distinctive and pervasive?

Faith

Traffic engineers will tell you that the Lagos to Ibadan Express Way is not particularly fast. An urban planner will inform you that it is not just a road. This 130km long corridor is host to a large conglomoration of charismatic churches concentrated at the two nodes; evangelical bookends intended to keep the populace within the bounds of their prescriptive codes. Names range from the prozaic to the ridiculous on signboards, walls, buses and the back of motor vehicles. With characteristics agnostic bemusement I made a note of the more colourful names and their associations with the city:

Moving from Ibadan, 'Access to Christ' will no doubt provide you with the 'Salt of Life' that enables you to enter the 'Church of Christ' (...along the way you may be required to pass through 'Breakthrough House') to meet 'Christ the Good Shepherd'. The 'Power of the Old' provides you with the 'Unlimited Harvest' which you celebrate at the 'Triumph Church Mission' where, upon entering the outer reaches of Lagos, you exclaim: 'Hurray! God is Here' in time to join the flock at the 'Redeemers' University'.

Nigerians apparently constitute a very religious nation; extremes discernable in the fundmentalist tendencies of the North and fervour identifiable in the flamboyant dimensions of many of its Christian places of worship. Why such devout tendencies I wonder? Living in Ibadan or Lagos cannot be easy, especially if you are poor. Service provision has simply not come close to matching urbanisation rates and living conditions are marginal for many, a situation perpetuated by the partitioned economy. My middle class background and training in the social sciences inclines me towards the 'opium of the masses' argument. No doubt the Church provides a expedient distraction from the failures of the State and the unequivocal plunder of the country's rich resources. (While oil fields proliferate, traders sell this locally scarce commodity at a %150 mark-up on sidewalk to match demand.)

On the other hand, my Nigerian friends tell me, it provides an institutional base for the intricate networks that include business contacts and training, marital counselling amongst many other social and economic functions. The Church contributes to a sense of belonging and membership is intricate to the management of perceptions. Should you not belong to a church, I am told, you are viewed with suspicion and tainted with that familiar stereotypical brush: criminal activity. In the absence of an effective state, where business deals are negotiated in US dollars or Euros and city hotels charge exorbitant rates even by Manhattan standards, the Church deals in that elusive resource: hope. As I reflect on the other stereotypical qualities discernable on the streets of Lagos and Ibadan - tenacity, creativity and invention - I cannot help but conclude that this may be the most valuable currency of all.