December, 2011: Lagos, 9Ja 4

Everyday as I commuted between the island and mainland Lagos, the scenery outside the window changes. As you approaches Lagos Island, you see the Marina club and the gleaming office towers. In the other direction, old buildings and slums.

These bridges connect, at the same time divide.
This divide is between the north and the south, between the Christians and the Muslims, and between the have and have-not.
It's not unusual to see big new luxury European SUVs out on the streets in Lagos, then again, poverty is visible all around you.
By the time I left, it was 2 weeks from X'mas. The X'mas lighting were up. Not in the scale of Orchard Road, but enough to light up a short stretch of the road outside the Zenith Bank.
For a country where NEPA (Nigeria Electric Power Authority) can also mean No Electric Power Again (HDB = Highly Dangerous Building? :)), I wonder how much diesel go into the standby generator that powers all these lights.
It's not that uncommon to find mosques and churches standing side-by-side, but the religion split within the country is always on the news. Unity takes much effort.
This festering religious divide boiled over during Xmas, when the terrorist group Boko Haram started bombing churches in the Muslim-majority north.
Then came New Year, when fuel subsidies were withdrawn by the federal government.
The resource curse is quite evident here. While hugh ships ply the waterway before the office bringing out the petrolum resource of Nigeria, not every citizen is benefitting from it.
Nigeria produces oil, but has no adequate refinery facilities. What money that had pour into building such facilities were squandered away by corrupted officials. While Singapore, a tiny island with no natural resource had an entire isalnd (Jurong Island) to handle oil refining for the Shells and BP. If the African do have an "enduring admiration" for LKY (if this article in The New African suugests), that could be the reason.
But, the author should get these facts right: LKY was never the first President, nor was Singapore a fishing village by the time LKY took over.

As I left on an Air Nigeria plane, I wish Nigeria and her people well. And to the beseiged President, I say Goodluck Jonathan, Good Luck.