Monday, March 30, 2009

Will Connors writes Lagos

In Slate (part 1 of 5), here.

Posted by Jeremy at 6:54 pm

6 comments:

Rising from my Ashes,  10:17 pm  

how does Willy know "The prostitutes have business cards"?

Anonymous,  10:20 pm  

Regardless of the negatives, Nigeria is the best country on the planet.

Anonymous,  10:48 pm  

@10:17pm -the pun was predictable! C'mon - 'Will' becomes 'Willy' in the same breath as 'prostitutes'.
The article, I believe was meant to be observational and factual. I think he achieved it.

snazzy,  8:35 am  

the article was well written, but with the expected dichotomy of rich lagos and poor lagos. Just once, I would like an expat "writing Nigeria" to acknowledge in writing that there are not just really rich people and really poor people in Lagos. More than anywhere else in Nigeria there is some semblance of a middle class in Lagos.

Another thing that annoys me about the article, is that he falls into the trap of single sourcing that Nigerian newspapers love; where one random quote from a random person is taken as authority. For example the random town planner guy that says that the lagos 1985 masterplan has not been followed and this is used to show that Lagos is growing without a plan. Which is not strictly true as Fashola is following the plan set out during the Tinubu administration.

And it is clear that he has never been to Oshodi, or Yaba for that matter, for him to say that Fashola has only done stuff for the rich folk. Though I suppose why should facts get in the way of story.

Ok I will stop now

plastiQ,  9:14 am  

I actually think the writer was in a hurry. Accepted, he had his facts straight and correct, but then...

Oguro,  1:25 pm  

...fact Lagos Metropolitan Masterplan was worked up between 1974 and 1979/80 had a short range projection - upto 1985 and long range 2000. The urban form of Lagos does have a reference in this document. The proposed mobility network - primarily roads - have been generally been implemented to this plan.

There is a degree of planning, it's just not connected to the reality of Lagos ... far too utopian and yes ..elitist and capitalist ...

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