The state of slum dwellers in a ghetto in high-brow Lekki, Lagos State, after their homes were demolished by the state government and their sources of livelihood destroyed, leaving them to wander the streets. SHARON OSAJI writes

At the first exit of the Marwa Roundabout along the Lekki-Epe Expressway, leading to the popular Elegushi Beach, is a slum recently demolished by the Lagos State Government.

As our correspondent approached the area, the smell of smoke filled the air, with heaps of burnt garbage and the ashes mixed with black soil rolled up to the extreme ends of the ghetto. According to residents, this place was once inhabited by over 10,000 people.

A police van, with the inscription ‘Lagos State Taskforce Monitoring and Enforcement’, was packed at the entrance of the ghetto, with two policemen seated inside.

This reporter visited the ghetto on a rainy Wednesday and observed that many people found shelters under big, old, worn-out umbrellas that housed about 15 people each.

For some who weren’t as lucky to find shade under the umbrellas, they managed to get nylon and old sacks to cover themselves, while others, who had neither, stood still under the rain by different fences, waiting for the downpour to subside.

Just by a broken gate that had almost given way, a 39-year-old woman, Blessing Amaechi, drenched in the rain, sold all sorts of drinks in a cooler which she covered with nylon. She also had a transparent bucket where she arranged various plastic bitters and sachet gins.

This reporter later learnt that Blessing was a widow who lost her husband last year and also lost the little property they had together to his family members.

She had lived in the slum for six years where she had a child with her husband. But since the demolition, she and her child were forced to roam the streets daily in order to find a place to lay their heads.

While it was raining, Blessing took her five-year-old daughter to stay in a commercial bus owned by a friend in the ghetto. The vehicle was parked not too far from where we stood.

“The state government, through Taskforce, is in charge of demolishing the ghetto. The right side of the ghetto was demolished about six weeks ago, while the left side, which was where I used to stay, was demolished only three days ago in the early hours of Sunday (June 25) at 3am.

“We were given a notice of only five days to relocate out of the place before the demolition. But the issue is where do we go? If we had where to go or there are affordable houses for the poor, we would not be here in the first place,” she said.

The middle-aged woman had small muscles cupped around her arms like someone who had been used to hard labour. She stood up to give a man a bottle of soft drink from the cooler then sat back on her small wooden stool.

“We now sleep like animals,” she continued. “If you come here at night you will see people just littered along the road. Some sleep on benches; some sleep on top of parked cars or inside buses; some sleep on the bare floor, while others even sleep standing. That is where we will stay till morning whether it rains or not.

“Others who took some of their nylon and wood before the demolition and burning of the ghetto, set up small shelters at any available space they find just to have somewhere to lay their heads for the night. That is the state of things here for all of us; men, women and children,” she added.

Blessing told our correspondent that she and her five-year-old were “lucky” to find shelter in her daughter’s school, where they sleep on the floor in one of the classrooms, adding that the school management must not find out.

Fire incident

A fire incident from the shanties prompted the state government to demolish the ghetto.

Residents said the fire started from a single gas cooker which spread through a large portion of the shanties and affected two buildings in an estate on the other side of the street, which shared a fence with the ghetto.

A resident, Ali Isa, who led our correspondent through the now-demolished ghetto, pointed out the site of the fire and the affected buildings.

Although the main building was not affected by the fire, the roof of the balcony and the water tanker were burnt. The second building had minor defects which were being repaired.

Our correspondent gathered that it was not the first time fire would emanate from the shanties, but this was more severe.

Narrating what happened, Isa said, “A young girl was trying to cook one afternoon when she lit the gas cooker, but somehow, the thing exploded and caught fire. Since our homes are made up of nylon and wood, it easily spread through the shanties and became a big deal.

“We started running helter-skelter, looking for ways to quench the fire but we couldn’t contain it. It spread from the middle of the ghetto to the fence of the estate and the two buildings were on fire. We then called the fire service when we realised that it was beyond us.”

Isa said although firefighters from the state fire service put out the inferno, the damage had already been done.

“We were happy that the men arrived on time when we called them and the fire didn’t spread to the main house. The girl that started the fire immediately ran away from the ghetto and we have not seen her since then,” he added.

He stated that it was a few days after the incident that the Lagos State Environmental Sanitation and Special Offences Unit (Taskforce) came threatening to demolish the shanties and served notices, giving them five days to vacate the area.

The Chairman of the agency, Sola Jejeloye, through the Director of Public Affairs, Gbadeyan Abdulraheem, in a statement, had said that the notice became necessary in view of the rising cases of pollution and fire incidents, which almost led to the destruction of buildings on the other side of the street.

Jejeloye had expressed government’s displeasure and worry over the squalid environment, which he said could also serve as hideouts for criminals and pose security threats to residents in the area.

“Shanties, illegal structures like this are known for indiscriminate disposal of waste materials which is not in tandem with the state’s vision for a mega city status. The Lagos State’s zero tolerance for environmental abuse, illegal and indiscriminate dumping of refuse and defacing the environment is going to be followed to the latter and we will make sure our objective here is achieved,” he added.A visit by newsmen shortly afterwards showed that the ghetto had been completely brought down, although the area was still littered and dirty.

The slum dwellers decried the burning of their belongings and means of livelihood by the Taskforce, while some alleged that they were beaten by of the Taskforce and some soldiers.

They added that no provision was made by the government to ease the burden of displacement after their makeshift homes were brought down.

Battered, goods, clothes burnt

As this reporter proceeded into the ghetto, a group of young boys were seen walking out, many of them without shirts, as they conversed in Yoruba among themselves.

They stopped and approached Isa, demanding to know if this reporter was from a foundation seeking to help people out of the ghetto as they lobbied to be chosen.

This reporter observed that one of the young men, who identified himself only as Clement, wore a nylon raincoat and a short.He told newsmen that all his clothes were burnt when the Taskforce demolished the shanties.

He raised the raincoat to show his back, which was filled with injuries.

Clement claimed that he sustained the injuries from soldiers who accompanied the Taskforce to raid the ghetto. Adding that he was almost killed.

He said, “This nylon raincoat, black pair of shorts and face cap that I am wearing are the only things I have in this world. This is all I have. All my clothes were packed and burnt when they came to demolish this place.

“We tried to quickly gather our things and run away but they wouldn’t let us. We were beaten and dehumanised. I sustained all the injuries on my back from soldiers who beat the hell out of me for trying to pack a few things before they demolished the place. My bag was taken from me and thrown into the fire.”

Clement, who seemed to be in his 20s, said he used to sell groundnuts and onions. He claimed that he was not allowed to also take out his goods as they were all crushed.

“I understand that the government wanted us to leave this place, but when you destroy people’s sources of income, how will they fend for themselves and raise money when they move out? Many of us are back to square one and have lost more than when we arrived here.

“They want us to leave and have destroyed our homes; instead, we have taken to the streets because there is no alternative. In the Western world, I know that shelters are provided for poor people where they pay daily. Here, we have nothing like that; you just displace over 15,000 people and ask them to move out without adequate provision for the aftermath.

“The question is where are we going to? People that are living in nylon and wood, how do they expect us to pay for rent in Lekki? Prices of things have tripled and the cost of living has gone up drastically; we can’t even afford to return to our villages because our goods have been destroyed, so how can we raise money? We are just stranded,” Clement said bitterly.

While Clement spoke, the crowd grew bigger with many chorusing in agreement after him.

Soon, Afeez, a bus conductor, joined Clement in the circle, showing the bruises on his back as well and saying he was also battered by the soldiers.

He was still talking when somebody in the crowd shouted in Pidgin English, “Mama this boy almost die for their hand, na God save am o.”

At this point, Afeez took off his shirt completely, revealing the marks and bruises across his back and hands. He also had bruises on his face and lips that seemed to have been stitched with some teeth missing.

“There’s no joy in this place,” Afeez said as he spoke to this reporter. “Why are people this wicked?” he asked.

He continued, “If we were going about constituting a nuisance, that would have been different. The most painful thing is we were doing legitimate businesses to cater for ourselves and our families. Even if the authorities wanted us to vacate, it should have been done in a better way, not by beating people up like thieves and burning our belongings.

“How are we expected to survive legitimately now? There’s no joy in this place,” he reiterated, snapping his fingers.

Afeez noted that while many of them slept by the roadside at night, “policemen sometimes raid the area and pack us to their station, saying our presence is a threat.”

After chatting with Saturday PUNCH, the boys headed out, saying they were going to ‘shadow’.

This, they explained, meant going to look for bus drivers to work for as conductors for the day in order to get money to feed.

Two children were playing in the midst of the young men, and as they went off, one of the men offered to take them to their mother. This reporter followed closely behind.

Iya Bidemi, as she was fondly called, had no different story to tell.

The middle-aged woman had erected a small makeshift building just for herself and her children, which she could easily dismantle should any issues arise.

She had no footwear on as she walked about bare feet, wearing a blue dress which was obviously worn out and dirty.

Her young sons, Abidemi and Femi, looked unkempt and wore torn orange T-shirts with a pair of jeans and sandals. She claimed those were the only clothes they had.

“I used to sell petty goods like chin-chin and biscuits but they were all destroyed. It is only the clothes that my children and I have on that we were able to go away with. We lost everything.

“Now that we are in the rainy season, sometimes they can go days wearing the same clothes. If the sun comes out for a while, I will quickly wash their clothes, while they stay naked till they dry up before I clothe them again,” she added.

When asked about her husband, she said he left her and the children a long time ago and she had been the only one fending for them.

She continued, “They don’t go to school anymore; it is only a child that has eaten that can go to school. I have absolutely nothing to do at the moment, everything was lost.

“Sometimes, the Taskforce will come around into the ghetto to see if anyone is still residing here; when we sight them coming, everybody will run away for fear of being beaten or picked up. But the truth is that we have nowhere to go. Let the government help us please.”

‘We voted ruling party’

The Arewa community spokesperson for Victoria Island and its environs, Saheed Abubakar, who also resides in the slum, said the government was fond of taking drastic decisions without considering citizens.

He stated that many of the slum dwellers voted for the ruling party in the last elections, and were unhappy about their abandonment.

Abubakar said, “When the government wants to take actions, sometimes they take drastic actions on their citizens. Politically, we are the northern coordinators who coordinate our people during elections.

“This place housed over 10,000 people, and in the last elections, we made sure that we all voted for the ruling All Progressives Congress, both for presidential and governorship elections. We are all APC members.”

But after the state election, Abubakar, who is also the council’s vice chairman for miscellaneous matters, said in about three weeks, officials from the state government demolished the place “after we voted and made sure the governor came back for a second term.”

“We fought hard on the ground for his return to power, mobilising and sensitising our people, because we believed in the governor. With his performance in his first term in office, we agreed that he deserved a second term. But we did not expect this, at least his government is supposed to have mercy on the citizens,” he added.

He noted that in advanced countries, shelters were usually provided for the poor, saying their governments made alternatives available before displacing people from their settlements.

“But look at people here sleeping under the rain with nowhere to hide, both women and children displaced! Just have a look around and see people all over the place lying down along the street.

“What will it take the government to allow the people to settle down here while giving them the conditions of settlement? Or better still provide low-cost shelters for the people where they can pay rent daily or weekly.

“The government has empty lands all over the place, even beside Elegushi here towards Jakande there’s very wide land there facing the beach that is empty. If they think we constitute a nuisance here and disturb residents, why not build something there in a place where we will not disturb anybody?” he queried.

Abubakar said it was “unrealistic” for the government to expect people who might have lived in the settlement for many years with their families to “just stand up and move”, after a few days’ notice.

He added that such an act meant that the government had “no human feelings”.

“These people who voted for you, is that the way to pay them back? By putting them inside the rain again, with no alternative, no palliative, no measure put in place to cushion the effect?” he asked angrily.

“The police van has been here for nearly two months to ensure that we don’t return to the ghetto. But see people littered all over the place; when it rains you will see over 20 people scrambling under one umbrella. Is that the life they want for us?” he pondered.

Abubakar urged the state governor, whom he described as a “good man” to help his people.

He claimed that the trading activities that were going on in the ghetto before the demolition were well over N1bn, adding that some residents had also volunteered “to contribute money and fix the houses that were affected by the fire”.

Another resident from Adamawa State, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said many of the people from the North who lived in the ghetto were displaced by Boko Haram and fled to Lagos to start afresh.

He said, “We were happy when Lagos accepted us because many of us were displaced by Boko Haram when it was at its peak and our homes were destroyed. Some local governments were completely levelled and many of us have nowhere to return to.

“So, for the fact that we were accepted here, we felt loved and accepted. But with what has happened now, it’s unfortunate that we are being robbed again of our humanity and forced to start afresh.”

Estate applauds demolition

The Manager of Lekki Zone 10 Phase 1, Toriola Gbolagbo, whose estate shared a fence with the ghetto, said the slum dwellers were a menace in the area.

He noted that a total of four fire incidents had been recorded in the ghetto, of which two affected buildings on the estate.

Gbolagbo said, “There have been three fire incidents that emanated from the ghetto that I am aware of before the last one that caused the government to step in and send them away, although the other three were not as severe as the last.

“Also, on two occasions, we have caught people from the ghetto jumping the fence at night into the estate, so they were a security risk. I have had residents tell me that if they knew that living on the estate with the slum dwellers as neighbours would be so chaotic, they wouldn’t have bought houses there. The slum dwellers would play very loud music into the night that nobody around would be able to sleep.

“Although estate residents have written letters multiple times to the Lagos State Government to alert them about the ghetto before it grew this big, they (the government) didn’t do anything about it until this last fire incident. Letters were written in 2016,2017,2019 and 2023.”

He noted that residents were “more comfortable” since the demolition of the ghetto.

“So far, so good. The loud music and frequent burning of tyres, trash and general smoking around the estate have reduced. But there are times when men of the Taskforce would come and fire tear gas around the demolished land to chase those who are trying to return back to the ghetto,” he added.

A security man from Hon E. Adedeji Estate, just adjacent to the ghetto, who spoke with newsmen on condition of anonymity, said residents from his estate had no business with the slum dwellers.

He said, “We really have not had any disturbance from the slum dwellers, it is the estate that shares a fence with them that is affected. In fact, you rarely see them around our side.”

Lagos, army play possum

When contacted about the plight of the slum dwellers and the government’s plan for them, the Director of Public Affairs, Lagos State Ministry of Housing, Adeola Salako, said the ministry was not in charge of the resettlement of slum dwellers.

Salako, who sympathised with the people, promised to help this reporter find out who was in charge.

She then directed our correspondent to the Ministry of Physical Planning and Urban Development.

She said, “The situation of the slum dwellers is a very sad one, but the housing ministry does not cover resettlement of slum dwellers. I will try to help find out who is in charge and get back to you. In the meantime, you can speak with the Ministry of Physical Planning and Urban Development.”

But when contacted, the spokesperson for the Ministry of Physical Planning and Urban Development, Mukaila Sanusi, said he was not aware that any demolition happened in the area and declined comments.

“You should reach out to LASBCA; they are the ones who handle such,” Sanusi added.

Our correspondent then reached out to the spokesperson for the Lagos State Building Control Agency, Adetayo Asagba, who did not pick up multiple calls nor respond to messages sent to her line.

Similarly, the Chairman of the Lagos State Environmental Sanitation and Special Offences (Enforcement) Unit, Sola Jejeloye, when contacted to get his reaction to the allegation of harassment of the displaced residents, he did not respond to a text message or take the multiple calls made to his line for over two weeks.

Also when the Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, Benjamin Hundeyin, was unreachable for comments as of the time of filing this report.

Meanwhile the PRO for Lagos State Urban Renewal Agency, Mrs. Adeola Olagoke, who said she was unaware of the demolition, said her agency was not in charge of this particular case.

She said, “I am not aware of any demolition in that axis and if there was, we are not in charge of it. The demolitions we handle, we make sure we always provide an alternative for the people.

“This particular one you have mentioned is not one of our projects so I don’t really know who is in charge of that. When we identify slum areas, we make our recommendation that the place needs to be demolished, and we also make proposal for their resettlement. But the one you have mentioned now is not part of what we are handling, so I don’t have any information as regards that.”

When contacted on the allegation of the brutality of the slum dwellers, the spokesperson for the 81 Division of the Nigerian Army, Lt. Col. Olabisi Ayeni, wondered why Nigerians always designated anyone in a green uniform as a soldier.

He said, “I am actually not aware of anything like that but just give me some time to do some investigation and get back to you. But I don’t think our soldiers would do anything like that.

“Also, when people allege soldiers, we should check back, because people just allege soldiers when they see men wearing green uniforms; they just conclude they are soldiers. But I would get to the root of what happened there.”

As of the time of filing this report, Ayeni had yet to get back to our correspondent with an update.

Experts knock govt

The National Coordinator of Take It Back Movement, a human rights organisation, Juwon Sanyaolu, said it was “sad and unfortunate” that the provision of housing for the masses was still a problem for the government.

“It is very sad and quite unfortunate, especially when we read through the binding document of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, the constitution, that explicitly spells out what should be the primary role of the government, which is to guarantee the welfare and security of its people.

“Housing is primary welfare that the government should provide for its citizens; it is quite unfortunate that the Nigerian government has been failing grossly in this aspect. But Lagos State, especially, has been notorious for this,” he said.

Sanyaolu said Lagos had a trend of demolishing houses, adding that when citizens “go the extra mile” to provide for themselves what ordinarily they should enjoy, “the government would still go after them.”

He estimated that the demolition of property in the state should be running into millions and probably billions of naira, with the poor bearing the brunt most times.

“It is not a bad idea if the government must do some sort of restructuring or resettlement, but at the very least, it should not be at the cost of undermining the primary responsibility of governance, which is still the fact that they must provide an alternative settlement to persons whose means of livelihood and general means of existence have been disrupted.

“There should be a sense of responsibility to at least cushion the effects of the kind of policy that is being brought in. What they are doing is killing and starving the poor to establish big monuments for the rich,” the human rights activist said.

He continued, “Many big settlements today on the Island where places poor people were violently displaced from. What we have is a government that, rather than protecting the weak, feeds the weak directly to the privileged.

“I think the society needs to wake up and take up the Nigerian state. It is not enough for people to sleep under the bridge or in the rain, we have a duty to defend all these people and ensure that government complies with its responsibility.”

Sanyaolu said the situation was not peculiar to Lagos alone, adding that Abuja was also well known for such things.

Another human rights activist and National Coordinator of the Youths Rights Campaign, Michael Adaramoye, said the fire incident that prompted the demolition of the settlement showed that poverty and development could not coexist.

He said, “The first thing to note is that housing is a fundamental human right and people should have access to conducive housing, so the excuse of demolishing a whole community because of a fire incident is not tenable, because over the years other settlements have been demolished without a fire incident; it was just an excuse and a direct attack on the poor.

“The fire incident actually shows that you cannot have poverty side by side with development; you cannot have people living in miserable conditions and other people living in comfort and wealth and expect that there will be perfect coexistence. The main solution to that is to see that the living condition of the people on the other side of the divide is upgraded to a humane standard.”

Adaramoye said what the government had simply done was to “compound the problem” because more homeless people desperate for survival had been released into the streets.

“What the government ought to have done, even if there was a pressing need to upgrade that environment, is to first get an alternative housing or settlement for the people. Even at that, there ought to be adequate compensation and provision for people who would be affected, before going ahead to demolish the whole place

“But alas, we have always run the same system, where government takes from the poor to give to the rich. If peradventure the land is given to a developer to build estates on, many of the poor people evacuated would not be able to afford anything close to the price of the houses,” he added.

The activist also agreed that the issue was not only peculiar to Lagos alone, saying “it is an agenda of the ruling class anywhere they come about the idea of development.”

He continued, “Also, there is the issue of social crisis. What starts happening in such cases is that some of the displaced people become organised and we start to hear of new gangs springing up in different areas. The instinct of survival is natural; people will always seek to survive, always seek to get where to sleep and what to eat no matter how bad it is.

“If the government is making policies that threaten the survival of citizens, the people will also be forced to make ways, which in most cases are criminal, in order to survive.

“Of course, we support and want development but what we advocate is that it must not be done to the detriment of the people. If at all there is a need to demolish a place, there is also a need to make alternative arrangements and compensation for them so that government policies will not be seen as a direct attack on the poor.”

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