Written by Blessed Adjekpagbon
There are three different categories
of motorbike riders in Nigeria. They are "Okada" riders, Dispatch riders
and Power bike riders. The brand and quality of the bike determines the type of
service it is usually used for according to government regulations.
Different factors distinguish an Okada
rider from both the dispatch or power bike riders. Firstly, it is an individual
commercial motorcycling business for transporting folks and goods to different
places within a suburb or from one suburb to another.
Unlike an okada rider, a dispatch rider
works for a particular courier company. He delivers small parcels to clients on
behalf of the company he works for. In most cases, a delivery box is usually
mounted on the position of the bike's back seat. However, a power bike rider is
a private individual that uses his highly superior machine for his personal
movement at a fast pace to wherever he likes.
Both the dispatch and power bikes' riders
are usually well kitted with safety helmets to protect their skulls from
cracking in case they get involved in an accident. But most or nearly all okada
riders in Nigeria don’t wear safety helmets despite government rules and
regulations that ordered them to do so.
The second difference is that an
average okada rider belongs to a special union of "Okada Riders Welfare
Association of the National Union of Road Transport Workers" in the
country. He operates in any branch of the association he chooses to ply
especially in Lagos. He pays tax daily to the association, unlike a dispatch or
power bike rider. This makes him always eager to make as much money as he could
to cover his daily expenditures on tax, fuel and maintenance of his bike. The
back seat of the bike that is meant for carrying one passenger at a time is
sometimes used to carry two or more passengers to make extra money. He is fond
of meandering sometimes dangerously between many cars or vehicles whenever he
runs into traffic jam. He does so like a snake running between trees in an
orchard, to get to his destination as fast as possible. This is one of the reasons
a lot of folks patronize him.
Despite their appreciable
contributions towards making some Nigerians overcome the delays caused by
traffic jams, many okada riders are not professionally trained. Although there
are a lot of graduates practicing okada riding in various places in the
country, the majorities of the riders are illiterates and disobey traffic laws.
This has caused a lot of avoidable accidents on the roads.
Prior to the advent of commercial
motorcycling business in Nigeria's major cities such as Lagos, Kano, Warri and
Port Harcourt to mention a few, the informal act of using motorbike as a means
of transporting people from place to place was commonplace mostly in
underdeveloped or rural environments of the country.
As time went by, as the population
of the country began to increase astronomically, it caused serious rural -
urban drift. For instance, as people keep trooping from rural areas into the
city of Lagos to look for greener pastures in the face of continuous yearly
increase in the production of graduates by Nigeria's higher institutions on one
hand, and lack of employment opportunities to accommodate them on the other,
many took to "Okada riding" as a source of making a living.
Nonetheless, to be a successful okada
rider in a vast commercial city like Lagos, one should have a great knowledge
of the roads networks. Whether an okada rider is operating within the streets
in a suburb or plying the major expressways, he has to be able to appropriately
calculate how much fuel he will burn to cover a distance to and fro. This will
enables him to charge the right amount of money from any passenger that
solicits his service. If he is not good at calculating the cost of fuel
required for transporting passengers or goods to and fro any given destination,
he may run into a loss.
In conclusion, the business of a
commercial motorcyclist is very dangerous as an average ckada rider in Nigeria
is always in a haste to make money, and disobeys traffic laws most times.
Several accidents have been recorded between some reckless drivers and okada riders
in Lagos. Some vehicles’ drivers see an average commercial motorcyclist as a
rival contesting speed with them on the expressways. Therefore, an okada rider
operating on any expressway is usually exposed to getting knocked down either
due to the recklessness of some vehicles drivers or due to negligence of
traffic rules and regulations by commercial motorcyclists.
No comments:
Post a Comment