Charles Okogene
‘Owo mi da’ an agberos seem to be telling a conductor here and no woman in their midst
There are women solders, police, navy, air force. In fact, there is no profession/occupation that has no women in its midst.
However, the profession that has little or no women in its membership/fold, it may interest you, my readers, is NURTW union members popularly known as ‘agberos’ in the south west and ‘ndi nburu’ in the south east. It is a job that has no regards for the clamour for gender equality; ‘agbero’ is a job that feminists are not bothered that they are not represented in there.
charlesokogene.com recently took an interest in what goes on there and decided to find out if there are women members of the union, especially among those on the road, come rain, come shine , that are armed with long canes chasing commercial drivers asking for ‘owo mi da’ and these are our findings in the Iju, Ogba and Ikeja areas of Lagos State.
“This our job is not meant for women,” an NURTW official at Kodesoh under the bridge in Ikeja who refused his name and picture in print bluntly told us. “You can see women drivers, women Keke Marwa operators but not the ones collecting daily fees from divers and bike riders,” our source said in impeccable English, which suggests that he is lettered.
According to him, he is not aware of any policy that forbids the enlistment of women into the job but he believes that non of the women folks have ever come forward to be recruited because of the risk and tough nature of the job.
“Can they endure the risk involved in chasing drivers and ready to fight them. No, they cannot. That I believe is the major reason they do not want to do it,” he said as he took a long drag on his cigarette and walked away.
Same answer we got in Ogba when we took our findings there.
An ‘agbero’ who gave his name simply as A.Y. has this to say in pidgin English.
” They no fit do am. It is rough, tough, and dirty job. This job no good. E dey too hard. So no woman go do am. They fit drive bus, drive Keke but not to collect money ‘ti pa, ti pa’ (obtaining money by force) from drivers and their conductors. See this mark for my face, na one conductor land me blow there last year wen I wan collect money from am,” he said.
Just before A.Y. finished speaking, another of his colleague who had just finished an argument with a Keke rider that almost resulted to a free for all over how much the driver ought to pay, joined in the conversation and brought in a different dimension.
“Have you ever seen a female area boy? Make I no lie you, this thing we dey do, almost be like that of ‘alaye’. So woman no go wan do am. Instead of them to do am, dem go do ‘ashewo,'” he said.
At Iju, a middle aged man that was introduced to us as the zonal chairman for Ishaga garage who refused to speak to us officially unless he was so directed from their headquatres, however, only managed to say that the tough nature of the job may be the reason ; “it is not attractive for women”.
According to him, no woman will want to be forcefully collecting money from drivers.
However, it was only in Onitsha, in Anambra State, years ago, that this writer, met some women that were used as decors to fill a bus so that real passengers can board the bus thinking it is about to move.
Effort to reach the leader of the agberos to get their official stand on the issue was frustrated as most of those we spoke to suspected our mission.
