Rail: Okada Riders Take Over Not-Yet-Commissioned Lagos Red Line Despite Ban

Despite the ban on operations of commercial motorcycles, popularly known as Okada, operators have taken over the yet-to-be-commissioned Lagos Rail Mass Transit Red Line overpass bridge, located in Ikeja-Along.

Our correspondent who visited the area observed that the operators operated with no fear, as they jostled for passengers at the ascending point of the bridge from Ikeja Under-Bridge.

Ikeja overpass bridge is a state government project which was supervised by the Lagos Metropolitan Area Transport Authority (LAMATA) and constructed by China Civil Engineering Construction Corporation (CCECC).

Although construction work was completed on the overpass bridge some months ago, it has not been opened for use by motorists. But some commercial motorcycle operators, who operate illegally in the Ikeja area, are now the ones using the bridge.

It would be recalled that Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu had in May 2022 banned the operations of commercial motorcycles in six Local Government Areas indefinitely.

The six local governments are Ikeja, Surulere, Eti-Osa, Lagos Mainland, Lagos Island, and Apapa. This is in line with the State’s Transport Sector Reform Law of 2018.

“After a critical review of our restriction on Okada activities in the first six Local Government Areas where we restricted them on February 1, 2020, we have seen that the menace has not abated. We are now directing a total ban on Okada activities across the highways and bridges within these six Local Governments and their Local Council Development Areas, effective from June 1, 2022.

“This is a phased ban we are embarking on this period, and we expect that within the short while when this ban will be enforced, Okada riders in other places where their activities are yet to be banned can find something else to do. We have given the notice now and we expect all commercial motorcycles plying the routes in the listed councils and areas to vacate the highways before enforcement begins. The enforcement will be total,” Sanwo-Olu had said.

In August 2022, the ban was extended to Kosofe, Oshodi-Isolo, Somolu, and Mushin as well as in the six Local Council Development Areas under the four Local Government Areas.

But speaking with THE WHISTLER on Wednesday, the Director, Press and Public Affairs, Lagos Environmental and Special Offences (Enforcement) Unit, popularly known as Taskforce, Gbadeyan Abdulraheem, said the agency is doing everything humanly possible to ensure that commercial motorcycle operators do not operate in restricted areas.

Abdulraheem noted that the operators try to maneuver when they observe that operatives of the agency are not present at a location.

“They’ve turned it into a kind of guerrilla warfare. When we advance, they retreat; when they see us coming, they retreat. When they know we’re not around the corner, or maybe we’ve gone for another operation somewhere else, you see some of them trying to manoeuvre,” Abdulraheem said.

Ikeja is one of the Local Government Areas where total ban on operations of commercial motorcycles is in full force.

He stated that the ban on restricted routes and all the state’s highways is still very much in place.