They Eat Our Sweat - new book exposes daily struggles of transport workers in Lagos

×

Error message

  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$ds_changed in eval() (line 16 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$ss_search_api_url in eval() (line 20 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$tm_title in eval() (line 20 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$ds_changed in eval() (line 16 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$ss_search_api_url in eval() (line 20 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$tm_title in eval() (line 20 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$ds_changed in eval() (line 16 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$ss_search_api_url in eval() (line 20 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$tm_title in eval() (line 20 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$ds_changed in eval() (line 16 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$ss_search_api_url in eval() (line 20 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$tm_title in eval() (line 20 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$ds_changed in eval() (line 16 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$ss_search_api_url in eval() (line 20 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).
  • Notice: Undefined property: stdClass::$tm_title in eval() (line 20 of /var/www/7/modules/php/php.module(80) : eval()'d code).

The book describes the everyday interactions between the drivers, their conductors, union members regulating the garages through which they pass daily, and police officers.

Metadata
Provider: 
The ConversationThe Conversation
URL: 
https://theconversation.com/they-eat-our-sweat-new-book-exposes-daily-struggles-of-transport-workers-in-lagos-206027https://theconversation.com/they-eat-our-sweat-new-book-exposes-daily-struggles-of-transport-workers-in-lagos-206027
Retrieved on: 
Monday, July 17, 2023
Information
Tags: 
Complicity, Rustavi International Motorpark, Prison, Crime, National Union of Road Transport Workers, Harvard University, Politics, Law enforcement, Survival, Perspiration, Research, Negotiation, Corruption, Disorder, Man, Police, City, Motorcycle, National Union, Film industry, Rail transport, Private investigator, Drug, Ridesharing
Geotags: 
NIGERIA
Summary
Key Points: 
  • The book describes the everyday interactions between the drivers, their conductors, union members regulating the garages through which they pass daily, and police officers.
  • I work tirelessly each day, while the ‘baboons’ (touts and police) stand in the roundabout and just chop (eat) my sweat.
  • His book is very welcome as he explores in detail the everyday survival of minibus and okada transport workers.
  • Like many informal workers, transport operators have no fixed income, no days off and no social protection.
  • The book also documents the efforts of some transport associations to challenge state laws which deprive workers of their revenues.

Extortion and complicity

    • Agbiboa suggests the daily encounters between agbero (the agents who collect fees from drivers for the transport union), drivers and police agents are marked by extortion and complicity.
    • The book asserts complicity between agbero and police agents and never between agbero and drivers.
    • My own observations in several motor parks in Lagos suggest, however, that there isn’t always complicity between agbero and police, and that complicity between agbero and drivers is very common.
    • None of them want the drivers working under their authority to be arrested, and many of them try to protect them against police extortion in order to keep business flowing.

Agbero seen as outlaws

    • Drivers insist that agbero are making easy money from their work but, as my research has found, agbero are often in the same precarious conditions as transport workers themselves.
    • In my view, the agbero has become the new figure of a long history of criminalisation of poor young urban men.
Copyright: 
2023 The Conversation. All Rights Reserved.