It was a sunny Tuesday afternoon. Mr. Desmond, as he would later introduce himself, stifled yet another yawn and appeared ready to listen, just as he wiped his face with his hands, reached for a dusty tract tucked somewhere in his dashboard and fanned himself in his rickety yellow bus.
His face looked relatively unwelcoming, and he was barely audible, but to a patient listener, he articulated his thoughts so well and sounded very eloquent. Desmond, 38, who is now a father of three, is first of all a graduate but has had to take up the job of a driver when he could not find a job. Thus, he depends on his little earning to sustain his family.
To any careful observer, his frustration about his current status was conspicuously written all over his face but he tried so hard to hide it and managed to flash a brief smile occasionally while his conversation with our correspondent lasted. He was initially reluctant to talk but after much persuasion, he opened up.
Though a graduate of Marketing from one of the universities in Nigeria, Desmond now shuttles between Iyana Ipaja and Oshodi in Lagos State, and delivers a certain amount to his boss, who turns out to be one of the touts in the park. He reckoned that his inability to get a job for several months forced him into the job.
Desmond would later explain to our correspondent how humiliated he feels ending up hailing touts before he could make a living. As a bubbling young man, Desmond had dreamt of being a successful marketer, most especially having spent six years for a four-year course in school. Now, he didn’t just end up being a danfo driver, he pays homage to touts and other miscreants on Lagos roads everyday in order to have it smooth with his job.
“I graduated about nine years ago, but when I could not get a job, I left Enugu, where I grew up and studied, for Lagos to stay with my sister. I had always heard that there were better job opportunities in Lagos, but after about one year of writing application letters, writing tests and going for job interviews, and nothing was forthcoming, my self confidence was eroding and I started giving up.
“Eventually, my sister introduced me to a man, who is into transport business (and has a number of danfo buses) that I should see if he could give me one of his buses to drive. I declined and even berated my sister for suggesting that kind of job to me. After some months, she reduced the stipend that she used to give me, so when I thought about it, coupled with the fact that I was getting older, I decided to accept the job offer.”
Desmond had thought that since he knew how to drive and had a valid driving licence, he would start driving while the owner would get him a conductor to work with him, but it was not to come that easy and cheap. He needed to go through apprenticeship.
“I was told that I would need to be a bus conductor for at least four months to be able to know the bus stops, learn how to collect money and give change, relate with the agberos, persuade and settle officers of the various security agencies on the road and then develop a hard face to confront stubborn passengers.
“I was told that since I’m from another tribe, I would need to learn Yoruba language and certain slangs, speak more of pidgin and not correct English. They also said I might have to consider taking spirits or smoking to make my face ‘fearful’, but I refused.
“That was when I knew there was trouble. I almost quit but I knew that the man would not welcome me if I came back after a rethink, so I decided to take it. I felt ashamed of myself that I had just accepted an offer to be an agbero, just like that, but there was no alternative. So I took it,” he explained.
He added that his frustration got to the peak on his first day on the job. “It was like the passengers conspired to attack me, and the driver didn’t say anything. I felt stupid, left alone and deserted. I thought of jumping down from the moving vehicle. It was that bad. I felt ashamed and I kept asking myself how I found myself there.
“I used to be very shy and scared of meeting people that I knew but eventually, I got used to it, and acted as if there was nothing to worry about. After about six months of being a conductor and identifying the bus stops, I started driving.”
That was not to herald a new dawn for him; he had the mandate of ‘delivering’ a certain amount to the owner daily, after which he could be left with N1,000 to take home, and that would be his income for the day. He said that even though he kept looking for a better job, he had become despaired and not hopeful of getting any. “But I won’t stop,” he added.
Desmond’s pathetic story seemed endless, but he is not alone. There are millions of Nigerians in such an unpleasant situation, who after leaving school were constrained to take up jobs that they ordinarily would never have imagined.
Worthy of note, however, is that the unemployment crisis in the country keeps biting harder, slowly hauling stories of regrets at the doorsteps of many graduates.
It is no gainsaying that one of the places where touts and illiterates abound in their numbers in Nigeria is the motor parks. In fact, it has become a rhetoric to use it to describe people who constitute nuisance.
But as notorious and fearful as these parks have become, especially in Lagos, it is worthy of note that thousands of graduates now form a part of the much-despised population, struggling to earn a living, while paying homage to the touts, prostrating for them and doing everything possible to curry some favour from them.
It is presumably a place where eloquence or chains of degrees do not count, and in certain cases, they tend to work against the holder. The park also qualifies as a place where serenity is in short supply. Thus, graduates who have taken up employment as danfo drivers in these parks confessed to living a life of frustration.
Stuck in unprofitable venture
Another graduate driver, who spoke to Saturday Punch, said if the money he realised as a driver had been worth the while, he wouldn’t mind, but that his take home pay had been nothing to write home about.
When our correspondent visited him at the popular Berger Park one Saturday afternoon, Mr. Akin Akinyele, a HND holder, appeared to have been overwhelmed by a deep sense of despair. He had just come back from a trip, but he returned almost empty-handed, save for the money he had to deliver to the bus owner.
He said that his average income had always been in the region of N1,500, including the money for his feeding, since most of them do not have buses of their own. “So at the end of the day, I go home with about N1,000 everyday. It could be less or more. The money to be delivered to the bus owner must be complete, but you, being the driver, can afford to go home without anything,” he said.
While narrating an experience he once had, which has kept him in debt till date, Akinyele said there was a time he parked to drop a passenger somewhere in Ojota, around a popular filling station, and he was arrested by officers of the Lagos State Traffic Management Authority for dropping passengers at an undesignated bus stop.
“Even though it is not a designated bus stop, we usually drop people there. But they arrested me and took my bus to their office in Oshodi. I was forced to pay N12,000 and I had to go and borrow. You can imagine someone with a daily income of between N1,000 and N1,500 paying a debt of N12,000 when I have children to feed and wife to take care of. So, at the end of the day, it’s like working for free. But what do I do?” he lamented.
His friend in the park, Tomi, as he simply identified himself, has an Ordinary National Diploma in Accounting. He pointed out that it was easier to make money outside the garage but that they would need stronger buses to do that.
“Before you can do soole (picking passengers along the road), you need a good bus but we can’t afford it. Those who do it make more money but they have higher target to meet, and that is why you see them driving like mad men on the road,” he said.
Time check was 2:33pm, and using himself as an example, he said he had yet to go for any trip that day and that he would still need to deliver to the owner.
“At the end of the day, I may not be able to go for more than one trip, and I must still deliver. My own boss cannot speak English, but he determines my fate everyday.
“I was very brilliant in school but that has not helped me here in anyway. So people like us end up working for touts. They dominate the parks and roads, so we really can’t do without them.
“This is not the place for any graduate, but painfully, many of us are constrained to do the job. It is unfortunate that we have to hail, prostrate for touts all in an attempt to curry their favour and avoid being mistreated by them,” he said.
Graduates working for touts
Akinyele and Tomi jointly pointed out that apart from the money they mandatorily pay to the owners of the buses they drive, they pay N1,200 per trip to the park authorities every day, usually collected by touts.
They added that they also settle loads of street urchins (agberos) on the road, thus, they would end up with little or nothing.
One aspect of the job that Mr. Charles, another graduate driver who plies Sango to Lagos Island, has yet to reconcile himself with is the fact that many of the people at the top echelons of the affairs of the park union are people who are not educated.
Charles is a university graduate with a 12-year-old degree, but he is now a driver. Having lost his job few years ago, he said he looked for another but could not get. Thus, he bought a bus from his savings and started the trade.
He recalled that he never tasted alcohol nor smoked, but that the kind of challenge he faces every day in the line of duty has compelled him to start drinking and smoking.
“I never drank or smoked, but now I do both. Every morning before I go out, I take certain things to get high because the kind of battle we face from agberos cannot be tackled by being a gentleman. They will even take advantage of you when you act like a gentleman. So, the best thing is to look like a gangster and a bad guy. Then, they will respect you. That is why you see many of such on the roads. There are many things that your level of education would not permit you to do, but you must do them, sometimes with guilt feelings, to have your way,” he said.
Lamenting on the stupendous lifestyles that the union officials live, he said he sometimes asked himself why he went to school if he could make so much money by being a tout. Notably, union leaders live like kings, “and that is why they kill themselves to get there because they spend free money,” Charles concluded.
“You won’t understand what I’m talking about until you attend one of the union’s meetings. They drive the best of cars, live in the best houses, live an enviable life and paint the town red with shades of colours. And some of these people do not even brush their teeth before going out; they cannot write their own names or speak English, but they are controlling graduates like me.
“Any driver, regardless of the qualification, who loves himself must pay obeisance to union leaders anytime and anywhere they appear. Some of the leaders have no formal education and they won’t allow people like us to get there, because they fear that with the knowledge we have acquired, we can intimidate them and maybe drive them out of office. The positions occupied by educated people in the union are Secretary (to take minutes of meetings) and Treasurer (to take care of the accounts).”
Asked whether he wouldn’t mind contesting for any of the positions to be able to have some freedom and influence, Charles simply said, “Never. I still need my life. My children and my wife need me as well. Do you know the kind of violence that often characterise the union’s elections? Very soon, their election will be tougher than general elections. So, I’ll rather continue to pay obeisance to them than to contest.”
Troubled by the wind of change
Sitting quietly inside his bus and talking on the phone when our correspondent walked past his bus was 46-year-old Kingsley. Although he wore a dark pair of sunglasses (to prevent being seen by known people) with a heavy chain hanging on his neck, the only thing that gave him away as someone with formal education was his accent. He sounded refined but with a conflicting outlook. Kingsley was at the edge of graduation when help left him in the cold, and he could no longer pay his school fees. Thus, he resorted to driving danfo to raise some money to go back to school.
Having been confronted and insulted many times by passengers, conductors, and street urchins, Kingsley has had to embrace the painful experiences that accompany his new job. One experience that he would not forget was when one of his church members met him and sought to greet him while he was on duty.
He narrated, “I had always worn my pair of glasses, mainly to avoid being recognised easily by people who might know me, but one day, one of my church members saw me while on duty and was surprised. Involuntarily, she asked if that was what I was doing as a job. I wished the ground would open and swallow me, but I answered and tried to appear okay. I think she had always seen me as a big man in church, obviously not aware of what I do, but that day, she saw me.
“She knew I was embarrassed, not her fault anyway, so she ended up encouraging me and expressing hope that God would raise helpers for me.”
Akinyele also told our correspondent that he used to be shy but that after some time, he had to live with the situation.
For Charles, nothing more could be humiliating than one night when his car broke down in the middle of the road while conveying some passengers from Sango to Agege. Apart from hauling all available insults at him, the passengers (both young and old) left him there, and just as they were about leaving, the rain began to fall.
“One of them, most likely in her early 20s, told me I was a fool. In fact, she called me ‘Olori buruku.’ Others called me names and accused me of cheating them, saying that was the way “all these useless illiterate drivers behave” just because I had collected money from them and my car broke down when we were almost mid-way to our destination. I wanted to give them change but they were busy abusing me.
“That day, I felt like committing suicide because I had never been insulted like that before. Not even by a younger person who should be about the age of my first child. For two weeks, even after I had repaired the vehicle, I could not work. I was just at home, thinking, sobbing and asking myself how I became a driver.”
Between destiny and fate
It may not all be doom for all the graduates who find themselves in motor park after all.
When our correspondent came across one of the drivers of the branded taxis in Lagos, nothing would give him away as a commercial driver.
Mr. Seun Ajayi had just come out of a bank, looking very decent and clean. Simply dressed in a white shirt, well tucked in his blue trousers, he was almost sparkling. But he is a commercial driver.
“I’m employed. I’m working, maybe not in the office but in my car,” he told our correspondent. “I carry high-profile people, decent people and I know that with the kind of connections that I have made on this job, I’ll soon have a better one,” he added.
He, however, attributed his better experience to the fact that he was able to secure the car through hire purchase.
Also, some drivers attached to the Lagos State-owned Bus Rapid Transit seem to have a better story to tell, as they are free from agberos and other touts. They are also salary earners and do not depend on touts to feed unlike their counterparts in the park.
Although Ajayi’s story is slightly different, Mr. Joseph, has had to embrace what life has thrown at him. Even though a graduate, he is currently a motorpark attendant at a popular motor park in Lagos mainland.
When our correspondent visited him on a Wednesday morning, he was dressed in the union’s uniform; a well ironed white shirt and a pair of green trousers, looking very sparkling.
Apart from being a graduate of a notable Federal Polytechnic in Kwara State, and having worked in a bank and a media organization before, Joe, as he is fondly called by his friends, says he has nothing to worry about, more so, having been on the job for four years.
He said, “Yes, I am a graduate and I work in a park, there is no big deal there. I know people look down on us but not everybody in the park is an illiterate or a tout. That is why I package myself. There are other graduates in this park and when you see them, you know the difference. Even though I’m wearing this uniform, nobody can talk to me anyhow. Some people have tried it, but once I talk to them, they realise that there is difference. I’m proud of what I’m doing because I know it won’t be forever.”
Interestingly, Joe said he used to board buses at the park when he was still in school and he never imagined he would come back to work there. For him, and some others like him, life has to move on.
Graduate unemployment, a national embarrassment
Considering how tough it is at the moment to get admission into the higher institution, some people who struggle and hustle to go through school with the hope of getting a job and earn a living have had their hope dashed and sometimes end up in the grave.
Such was the unsavoury story that followed the recruitment by the Nigeria Immigration Service in 2014. The NIS had sought to recruit persons to fill its 4,000 vacant positions in all the 36 states in the country but little had the commission known that that singular exercise was one that would give it a bad name.
Incidentally, over 6.5 million persons applied for the 4,000 vacant positions, and the exam scheduled for March 15, 2014 saw at least 16 people (graduates) sent to their early graves, while scores of people were fatally injured. This was due to the overcrowding, occasioned by numerous unemployed graduates, impatience and the resultant stampede, just because they were all desperate to get the job.
The level of unemployment in the country came again to the fore when Dangote Group of Companies advertised vacancies for professional drivers. To the surprise of many, PhD holders, Master’s degree and first degree holders applied to be drivers.
Even though many people are sceptical about the figures released by the National Bureau of Statistics that only 20.3 million Nigerians are unemployed and that only about 5.3 million graduates are unemployed, the Bureau claimed that 1.8 million graduates enter the labour market every year.
As a way of cushioning the effect of the hardship and bad feeling, unemployed graduates in the country have set up a body called National Association of Unemployed Graduates.
Notably, the unemployment rate in the country, coupled with other factors, makes Nigeria to rank among the five poorest countries in the world.
Between a wasteful investment and survival to feed
Suffice to say that the driving profession has had a lot of new hands in recent times. Many of the drivers who spoke to Saturday Punch lamented that their certificate has not helped them in anyway where they now find themselves.
“Sometimes, it even works against us. For instance, I won’t aspire to lead the union because I don’t have the money, connection and power (juju) that it takes to aspire to such office. But you would easily imagine that many things would have been better handled if we had educated people at the helm of affairs. But as it is now, since you can’t beat them, you join them,” Charles said.
PUNCH.
No comments:
Post a Comment