The New Face of Ibadan

I've lived in this great and ancient city of Ibadan for 19 years now and to be candid, i've had a great stay in this calm city. However, this city has been characterised by "dirtness" and "disorganisation". It ranked top as the "dirtiest" city in Nigeria. Indeed, Ibadan has been a "big slum". Lawlessness and non-challant attitude has been the order of the day. And we the "seemingly tush" ones have learnt to live in it, only caring about our own house and not even the rest of the street.
And when Fashola came into government in Lagos State and started the brutal revolution, many of us in Ibadan were quick to conclude that that was only possible in Lagos and such revolution cannot take place in Ibadan.
Oyo state with the slogan of "Pace Setter" has actually failed to set the pace in so many things in the past years up until now when it seems that a bit of fresh air is blowing into this great city.

The recent Ajimobi-led government in power at the moment has been taking the bull by the horn and making some radical changes in the city. It really hasn't been going down well on all of us. Yes, all of us.

Some days back, the members of the Youth Empowerment Scheme of Oyo State (YES-O) visited our area and asked all shop owners to vacacte their shops and remove the said shops within 7-days else it will be demolished. Since the day the notice was given, shop owners without having alternatives have been removing their shops to avid any form of destruction.
My dad and other some other boys had to practically "copy and paste" our two large "container-shops" from the front of the Quarters gate to the front of our own house in the quarters where we live. Now, there is no space to park and conveniently reverse the car.*sighs*. That is just by the way.

My Lagos-based doctor friend and I were chatting yesterday night and he asked me where the finest places in Ib were and I couldn’t even believe my own answers. I could not think of any “extra-ordinary” fine place and so I mentioned popular fast food outlets, make-up studios especially those concentrated around Bodija, Banks, Shopping malls, Amusement parks (not that we have so many), recreation centres, Churches and maybe the really fine private schools around.

Ibadan has been so dis-organized. The markets? Hmmnn Hmmmn (*shakes head). The traders practically displayed their wares and goods on the roads and we usually experience terrible traffic for no reason. Places like "Ojoo, Bere, Oje, Gate, Mokola, Sabo, Iwo-road, Bodija, Eleyele, Apata, Dugbe, Molete, Gbagi", to mention but a few have been characterised by unnecessary traffic because of shops that are almost into the roads. You need to have visited these above mentioned places before the on-going renovation started. You would have blamed yourself.

No one really cares about their health and safety. People live beside stagnant rivers; their shops are situated along these dangerous rivers, e.g."Ogunpa". The first time i went to Bere, I almost threw up. Even the so-called tush places in Bodija are no different. The roads? Most of them are in a dilapitated states. Thank God for the road repairs going on in different parts of the state and especially the over-head bridge at Mokola.

The change is here and though it isn't going down well with us all, we have to embrace it. Yes, arrangements should have been made before all the demolitions going on, especially for the shop owners who make their daily living from the things they sell and alternative roads should have been made motorable before  the road constructions in different parts of the city to avoid traffice, we should applaud the effort of this administration for taking such giant step to re-organize Ibadan.

For those that are non-Ibadan residents, i'd say to you: "WATCH OUT". The transformation has begun and you must have been seeing a bit of it when plying the Lagos-Ibadan Express Road, just after the Sat Guru Maharaji Centre.

It's a surgery we must all go through and in the end, we would have a city that we can boast of. And I won't have to scratch my head or give dumb answers to my Lagos-based Doctor-friend about the finest places in Ibadan.
But seriously, if you know any really fine place in Ibadan, let me know...*winks*.