The Lagos Metropolitan Area Transport Authority (LAMATA) says its partnership with the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) and other affiliated unions is helping to reshape public transportation in Nigeria’s commercial hub.
Speaking on Channels Television’s Sunrise programme on Saturday, LAMATA Managing Director, Abimbola Akinajo, explained that yellow buses, popularly known as danfos, still move the majority of commuters in Lagos and cannot be completely scrapped.
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“It is not about throwing away what exists,” Ms Akinajo said. “We work with the yellow buses because if you do not interact with them, you cannot speak of regulation; they are the ones who carry the majority of people in Lagos.”
According to her, the agency’s Bus Industry Transition Programme was created to integrate informal operators into the formal system.
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“It is a vision to bring the formal and the informal together. We understand what they want, and they know what we want,” she said.
She added that the unions were already operating one of the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) routes successfully, demonstrating their ability to adapt to regulated service delivery.
“What Lagos is constantly doing is working with them, ensuring that we begin to expose them to what it means to be a regulated service. They are beginning to understand this, and we are starting to see some dividends,” she noted.
Biodun Otunola, Managing Director of Planet Projects Limited, said transport reforms are critical for Lagos, a city of over 20 million people long burdened by congestion, unsafe travel, and poor infrastructure.
In his research titled ‘The BRT and the Danfo: A Case Study of Lagos’ Transport Reforms from 1999–2019,’ he noted that Lagos, once dominated by disorganised and unregulated danfos and molues, has made significant progress through the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system introduced in 2008. The system now carries more than 350,000 passengers daily.
Otunola explained that improvements in public transport have reduced travel times by up to one-third and saved the city an estimated $240 million in annual economic losses.
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However, he stressed that danfos—often criticised for safety lapses, poor maintenance, and fare instability—remain central to mobility in Lagos.
He added that integrating their operators into a regulated system, as LAMATA is attempting, could be key to sustaining transport reforms in Africa’s fastest-growing megacity.
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