Nigeria enforces bus lane restrictions

Did you know Lagos, Nigeria, has a wildly successful Bus Rapid Transit system?

Lagos Nigeria Bus Rapid Transit BRT

Nigeria is nominally a democracy with a republican form of government, but democratic government is frequently punctuated by military dictatorships.

So it’s kind of cool to see that current civilian government isn’t afraid to stand up to the military for what we would see as minor traffic offenses. The governor of Lagos State, Babatunde Fashola, caught Colonel Kayode Yusuf driving in the bus lane.

Here in the USA, he wouldn’t have even gotten the ticket. In Nigeria, the Army Colonel was fined ₦25,000 (roughly US$150) after a military court martial.

Governor Fashola oversaw the inauguration of BRT service in 2008, and approved ₦80B (about US$500M) to begin construction of Sub-Saraha Africa’s first light rail system outside of South Africa.

One Comment

  1. Clearly Lagos is more enlightened than Sunnyvale or Mountain View.  Here in Santa Clara County, not only do we not enforce the traffic laws, but we don’t have the political will to allow for BRT.

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