Night
travel may be fraught with a lot of dangers in Nigeria where highways are not
in the best condition and robbers use the poor state of the roads as an opportunity
to ambush interstate commercial vehicles.
But
in spite of these inherent dangers, there seems to be no reduction in the
number of people who choose to go on journeys in the night.
Investigation
by Saturday PUNCH showed that the attraction of some of the passengers to the
night travel was more bizarre as much as it was almost unbelievable.
When
Saturday PUNCH visited some parks to investigate, it found out passengers
preferred night travels for different reasons.
At
Jibowu, an area of Lagos where luxury buses load passengers to the Eastern part
of the country, Chidioke Ekezie, a motorboy attached to a bus of one of the
popular transport operators in Lagos, gave an insight into life on night buses,
which he explained could be very vibrant and "interesting" as a
result of the duration of the journeys.
"There
has never been a time that those taking night journey reduced. The thing is
that a lot of people just like travelling at that time simply because it is
traffic-free," Ekezie said.Asked to elaborate on the "interesting" part of the journey, which he had earlier mentioned, the motorboy said, "A lot of people make new friends and many young people who board the buses as strangers become couples during the journey."
When asked whether there is any sexual activity during these journeys, Ekezie smiled mischievously and said, "It is a known fact that it happens. Some people are just quite stupid. Most couples wait till we get to our designated bus stops to have sex.
"We could decide to drop the involved passengers there and leave because it is very silly for people to have sex in the bus."
A 23-year-old student, who preferred to give just his first name, Chukwueloka, was booked on one of the luxury buses to his home state of Imo, when our correspondent visited the park.
He said he always took night buses anytime he went home.
"Night
buses are interesting. A lot of things happen there," he declared, when
our correspondent had a chat with him on why he favoured night travel that
much.
A
lot of things like what?
He went into a narration.
"There
was a time I went to Yenagoa (Bayelsa State capital) in 2005. I boarded the bus
at Mazamaza and got a seat beside a fair lady who was also going to Bayelsa.
The journey was at least seven hours and we took off around 6pm.
"I
had been chatting with the lady since we left Lagos. About four hours into the
journey, she yawned and said she was sleepy. She rested her head on my shoulder
and there was no way she could be comfortable if my arm did not go around her
shoulders.
"My
arm brushed her breast mistakenly and she did nothing. It turned out that by
her body language as the journey went on, she wanted something. I had heard
about such things happening on buses but I did not immediately understand her
intention.
"She
later made it clear when her hand went to my zippers."
Chukwueloka
laughed as he narrated this unusual escapade. He said he would never forget it
for the rest of his life.
"I
just wanted to experience it. She sat on my lap and other passengers were
asleep in the bus. It was also dark," he said.
Having
a sexual encounter with a complete stranger may be a no-no for many people but
Chukwueloka told Saturday PUNCH he used protection.
At
Oshodi, another part of Lagos, where luxury buses load to the Eastern part of
the country, Saturday PUNCH spoke with some passengers to find out if any of
them had a similar story to tell.
Jane
Akuegbu, a student of the Cross River University of Technology, Calabar, said
the only reason she liked taking night buses is the peace and quiet that she
experiences during the journey.
"I
am lucky because even though some people say night buses get robbed, I have not
experienced that before," she said.
When
the issue of sexual activities in buses came up, she said she had heard about it
but had not seen one happen on any of the buses she took to the southern part
of the country.
She,
however, narrated an incident involving a bus her aunty once boarded to Abia
State.
Akuegbu
said, "My aunty boarded a luxury bus from Jibowu. The last bus stop was at
Aba and a man came out of the bus complaining that his wallet, his wrist watch
and the handbag containing his laptop had been stolen.
"My
aunty said when the young man explained what happened, every other passenger of
the bus made jest of him. What happened was that when all other passengers in
the bus were asleep, he made sexual advances at the lady he sat with.
"They
started fondling each other even though they were strangers when they boarded
the bus. The lady later offered that the man should suck her breast. The lady
must have rubbed a sleeping portion on her breast because the man slept off
afterwards.
"The
lady stole all his belongings and disembarked from the bus before it got to the
last bus stop."
A
passenger, Sola Olaogun, expressed his disgust about the subject when he was
approached on the issue of sexual activities in buses.
"What
would this world turn to? How can you do that kind of thing with someone you
don't know at all? I was so disgusted when I saw a young man and a lady
"fingering" each other in a bus I boarded to Owerri (Imo State
capital) the other day. May God deliver young men who do things like
that," he said.
'Fingering'
is a coined word for fondling in Nigeria.
A
motorboy gave his 'expert' opinion on the issue.
Felix
Uche, who has been accompanying luxury buses on journeys to the eastern part of
the country for five years, said buses heading to Uyo and Calabar are noted for
such activities.
"It
is real. Passengers have sex in the
buses. Even when our buses used to go to Uyo, we noticed such acts and that is
why we decided to stop going there," he said.
A
colleague of his, Kalu Ejiofor, gave his own version of the issue.
He
said, "There was a time a lady came to the park in Anambra to board our
bus. It turned out that her fare was not enough so a young man offered to help
complete it.
"During
the journey to Lagos, they obviously became friends. When the bus got to Benin,
passengers got down from the bus. A passenger got back in the bus and noticed
that same lady and the man were having sex in the dark at the back of the bus.
"He
alerted us. We really insulted and embarrassed both of them. They are not
supposed to be doing such a thing in a public bus because I personally don't think
it is decent."
Ikenna
Okafor, who works for another company told Saturday PUNCH that his years of
working as a motorboy had taught him that some Nigerians are perverts.
Okafor
said, "A lady came from Benin Republic to Nigeria. The stress of the journey
must have made her tired as she slept off. A man sitting next to the girl began
to "finger" her as she slept. He was molesting her! It was another
passenger who was awake that noticed the whole thing.
"He
was aware that the two of them did not come together and such a thing was
happening. It was then he alerted me. We woke the lady up and informed her
about what happened. It was so surprising that the girl was too tired that she
did not even know."
Evans,
an employee of a transport company, who preferred to keep his company's name
off record, said no transport company would encourage such acts.
He
said even though sex on night buses does happen on long journeys, a well
organised company would never condone such acts.
"I
have seen cases of people having sex outside the bus. Most times when the bus
stops to rest, I have seen passengers go outside the bus to have sex while
others go to ease themselves or stretch their legs," Evans said.
However,
a luxury bus driver, who identified himself simply as Zona, said that he was
less concerned about whatever goes on inside the bus while he is driving.
"My
only concern is the safety of the passengers," he said.
He
said government should work on the bad roads in the country to make it fit for
night travel.
Zona
explained that he had encountered more than ten robbery attacks in his seven
years of driving business.Zona stated, "I have been a bus driver for seven years. I drive during the day and night. On some of my night journeys, I notice that robbers attack mostly around the bad portion of the highway. The roads are terrible with many potholes."
Corroborating Zona's claims, Uche, the motorboy, who had spoken with Saturday PUNCH earlier, said a female friend of his was once raped and robbed when she came to visit him.
Uche
said, "There has been series of robberies on the Abuja highway and the
worst part of it is that the robbers are notorious for raping female passengers
too. I had a female friend that came to visit me. When she was travelling back
on the Abuja road, she encountered armed robbers and they raped her. Just last
week, they robbed one of our buses," Uche said.
"The
bad road is what makes it easy to perpetrate these crimes because buses are
forced to slow down in such bad spots. We encounter armed robbers on our
journeys sometimes but it has reduced. But the government right now should be
aware that Abuja road is very unsafe.
Over
the years, there have been several campaigns against night travels. The reasons
given by the Federal Road Safety Commission are that most of the roads are not
well illuminated and the poor state of most of Nigeria's highways causes
avoidable accidents.
But
while night travel may have its downside, it seems some passengers will always
favour it because of the different attractions it holds for them.
In
2011, the Federal Road Safety Corps said it had no constitutional power to ban
night travel, despite the high incidence of fatal accidents and robbery attacks
being experienced by people undertaking such trips.
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