 All right, thank you for staying with us. Now we are trying to place a bet who will win between Ilamovka and Zukaban. More just know ourselves now. If you are for thread, let me know. Yeah, I am going to bed, Niger. I am going to bed, Niger because I can't lose. All right, so in all major urban centers in Nigeria, the vandalism of infrastructure is an ongoing social issue. Despite the insufficient provision of infrastructure, criminals and mob have consistently vandalized the available facilities such as oil pipeline, airports, bridges and so on. This has undoubtedly put a strain on the limited resources of federal, state and local governments. Now for instance, an analysis published by budget, Nigeria's civil tech organization revealed how the Nigerian government lost $74 million every day in 2022 due to the decrease in crude oil output under the present Buhari-led administration with oil theft. Now hear this, being one of the most rampant form of vandalism. So it was due to oil theft that some of these things really happened now. In recent times of civil apprehension or unrest such as during the ensars we've seen cases of people taking to the streets to vandalize private and government owned properties as a form of protest. Now the case of the Niger bridge and most recently airport vandalism also goes to show that it is a premeditated act that happens even in the time of peace. So tonight we're asking what is the impact of vandalism on public infrastructure. Now please let's hear what you have to say. Remember you can join the conversation. Send us an SMS or WhatsApp to 08-1-803-4663. You can also tweet at us, at Weishu Africa one with the hashtag Weishu. You can also thread also that Weishu Africa. Remember we will add them because it will must now. You know Piyos. Let's be balanced. But this conversation I think is an age old conversation that I think I get really, really tired of talking about because and I said this when I took the story of the airport vandalism and I said something around, you know I notice it's most predominant when there's a change of government. So I remember I think it was a do-state governor doing a video. Was it even a do-state governor? No this recent one that just happened is signing. I can't remember what state is it Benway now. No single item was in the government house. I can't remember what state now. One of this newly elected governor was lamenting how no single furniture, no cannot thing was left in the government house. So you see this issue about vandalism. There is vandalism that happens on the streets, on the roads day to day. But even within government right and that's why I say that it is actually a difficult thing to solve because you know why the people that are supposed to be the protectors of this public infrastructure they are the ones that are most culpable when it comes to what's called vandalizing this infrastructure. Now take for instance the story that Iisi took on the airport lights right. Part of what they said within the story was that this light they steal it so that they come back to resell it because it is not particularly a kind of light that you can use anywhere else. It has to be at the airport. So I mean does that not tell you that somebody turns the blind eye. Go get it so that you know what since there's a new change in power we'll just put it as part of our requisition. That's why you see that even with the budget you see multiple padding. For something but did we not just fix this pipeline? We've seen the railway chairman come out to say that how they were pulling out the rail tracks of a newly built rail line right. How people were removing all the bolts and the nuts and all of that. These things continuously happen all the time. So I don't understand how first of all we have allowed this stage this long that it has not become a part of us because this is abnormal. You can't catch anybody anywhere outside of this country. Going to a public with the boldness to go and take on this thing. So when we talk about impact right it is coming back to us because what we are seeing now is repeated spend on an infrastructure that you should have moved away from a long time ago. You see the same infrastructure this time around and guess what if they had budgeted a billionaire last year. It will now be times three of what they spent because inflation and so many things have also impacted it. So we are not moving forward as long as we have issues around vandalism right with our infrastructure. We will never move forward. We will never get to that point where we truly have a functional infrastructure in Nigeria. That's my take. But let me hear your thoughts Jola. Well Ah Nigerians you see from the very lowest levels Nigerians have we are not accountable for anything. We have more respect for anything. And I mean personally I have seen a situation where I was on the road and a newly fixed road major road highway and there were boys digging just so that traffic would happen and they can sell their wealth. God bless you. So when it's easy to say that I always say that when there is no accountability no enforcement nothing would work. It's a whole collapse of the system. If I give an example a road is being done when a minister approves for this project to be done the contractor is supposed to have said this road that I am doing is supposed to be like this for the next five years maintenance will start in the sixth year I mean that's how I know that they do projects so you have M and E teams you have all these people on ground so it becomes I don't know how it is possible that nobody would hold a minister accountable if in two weeks a road that was supposedly just constructed you can see patches or you can see holes and the minister would wake up and still go to work the next day it's absolutely crazy so when we don't have checks and balances when they know that they can go scot free we are going to cut across all sectors just like that and that is what will make someone who is supposed to be in a public you know a government house paid for by taxpayers who feels they have earned the right to take government belongings to their personal homes it's crazy because even when you go to a hotel nowadays a hotel will tell you open your bag are you taking our towel? Returnings hotels are doing it now big hotels I'm not talking 20,000 big hotels so when people people would always step out of life naturally they want to see how far they can push but when people understand that if they cut you forget you are going to jail but what do you expect even the police man is there you are talking of petrol people siphoning petrol we are not here that it was military people you hear all sorts of things and then you just go like you know what Nigeria is just a free for all anything you can take just take and be chun let me know face your front and let me just do my own when it is your turn do your own meet and we will not talk that's how we are living now so you see this thing that we are saying we are just saying it we are just saying it because who wants to enforce it the person that we enforce it 90% is only the person dies tomorrow no people die nice if you can when you sign a letter and say oh you are going to check this the hand that you used to go and sign the letter the hand is swelling up swelling up let's take a break let's take a very short break when we come back from that break we want to open our full let's say your thoughts on this hi now wow thanks for sending us now we are just spending our ladies night out what's in the impact of vandalism and public infrastructure now please let's hear what you have to say remember you can join the conversation send us an sms or whatsapp to 081 8034663 you can also tweet at us at the way show after one of the hashtag way show our phone line is now open the number to call is 07025007749 that is the number to call remember turn off the volume of all the devices that you are watching us from the number again is 07025007749 you can use 0. ancestry send us comments that way let's get on definitely Mr. gia గ్వ్రక astron astronomy క్కివ్లిలాఉద37 ఱారనిించ్గENS  comparing వ్య్యాలాసఉgood మృడాలా OMG 19% !!! cortisol మృరూం arranంచ్రో Jerome మానిపన్లకెచిక్రేలవ్లి So there was a story, I think it was in June, sometime in June, that a man who was vandalising transformers died of electrocution. Now for me, that's like payback immediately. That's nature doing his own work. And the thing about it is that the power company might still have to suffer for that. Because when such a thing happens, depending on how or where he was placed on the, it can damage a whole lot of other facilities within the area. Now I'm rushing through this. So another situation I'll take will be sometime ago, I think it was in Ibadan, there was during this fall subsidy situation and a group of people were actually protesting. Now from protesting on fall subsidy, they decided to vandalise a bank and they were caught on camera. Some of them were arrested, but not all of them got away. But those that were arrested, only God knows what was done because it's not like we read the news afterwards. Follow-up news, there should be follow-up news saying if they're really doing their work, there should be follow-up news saying social people that were arrested have been convicted, or they've been charged to court or something, giving an update for it. Now I'm getting to the real one that has to do with government. Now the next one is real tracks. You have people that were vandalising real tracks. I think about around 3am in the morning they were caught. We haven't heard anything about them. Now the final one is the one that is quite amazing. Now a kind of state governor, when he got into, when he was sworn in and he got into his seat and he got to the states, started subsequent days, started demolishing all the previous, a few of the structures that had been put up by the previous government. By, I think, Governor Gandujie. So something like that, you might tell me some reports say it was done because they were on, that Gandujie had sold the property out. And it was government property. But I would say, well destroyed them. They were ordered, do you know how much in millions? I won't say billions because I don't know. But how much in millions? Do you know how much in millions I would have gone down during that time? Let's take our first caller for the evening. Then I'll come back to that health. I'll come back to you again, Jennifer. Hello, you're alive. Hello, hello. Good evening my dear sister. Hi Loma, good evening. Good evening. Good evening. Hello. Go ahead, we can hear you. Good evening. Yes, this woman from under your skin. We already heard your voice. The impact of vandalism. In fact, I don't know how to describe it. It's dangerous also. It can bring us back to the dark ages. The impact can make us to go back, you know, we are in technological age. It can take us back to the time where we used to use lanterns. When we don't even have life, that's the point. If it was vandalism, broad daylight vandalism, if it was a broad daylight vandalism, take it out and replace it as I'm talking to you. If it doesn't have rail, it's broad daylight vandalism. Give them that order. Why not replace it if it is not vandalism? So I'm trying. Use this your video and tell me that comment to give us red light again. Thank you very much. Thank you, Loma, because you see, when we talk about impact, imagine what a functional rail system will do to the economy. Do you understand? I don't understand why, because if it has lingered this long, it means that it doesn't... You know how people are happy to keep spending money on the same thing. If it were your business and somebody keeps stealing something, would you stomach it? Let me hear your thoughts, Jennifer. For me, you guys have actually really said it all. Actually, I mentioned how no one is taking responsibility for these things, and that's because it is coming from the top level. And then vandalism leads to financial waste. Like you rightly said, you have to keep repairing and rebuilding over and over again. And it is very hazardous to the human life. Now talking about the bridge, when you remove these things from the bridge or you create manholes, it means that someone would have an accident and eventually it might lead to death. People have lost their lives for little things like this. You're removing the runway lights. For what exactly? Because if you have a flight that is landing at night, how do you want them to land properly? So if something happens and people die, the blood is on your hands. And sometimes people don't really care about these things because they don't see the repercussion. Now it's not an immediate effect. So I get you and let us piggyback to what Deola had said. Because this one is immediate and it affects me. And I know like when they give me chest pain. You see this digging of road. It is a constant K. And I see that if a government was serious about curbing road vandalism, how people go and destroy roads, you would go and fish out the cartel that put these people as either beggars or street hawkers. Do you understand? People that don't have street hawkers on their roads, they've not died. Hunger has not killed them because there's no traffic. You can literally drive into a mall, buy what you want to buy and enter your car back and continue your journey. Do you understand what I'm saying? The fact that we have not accepted and it is part of us that we must have street hawkers on the road is what is tiring for me. Now I had travelled to Ocean State like I told you people the other time. I left Ocean State 4.30 in the morning because I wanted to beat every single traffic or whatever. We got to that beggar. I'm sorry, the long bridge or whatever, the regime camp. At 6.30 a.m., we didn't leave that road until 11.30 a.m. You're not even talking. So when you talk about impact, outside of even the financial loss, there is my health that is at stake. People have died in traffic, because somebody wants to deliberately slow down the traffic. So if you are serious as a government, first of all, burn all these people from the road. Find alternative means to get them gainfully employed so that we don't have to have them on the road and they don't have to destroy the roads because we're not as long as they are on those high ways trying to sell on a daily basis we will continue to have traffic and they will continue to vandalize us because you cannot just, you can't stop on a freeway. There's no traffic, there's no nothing. You have to slow down. Even when you're traveling outside of state, you will notice that where you find those hawkers are where they put speed bumps because they deliberately put those speed bumps there and all of that they will just quickly sell one or two things. So I'm saying to you that for the highways as long as we continue to have these people on the road they will continue to vandalize them they will continue to destroy government property. So if a serious government really wants to solve that problem then you must find a way to find real solutions to their own employment because it is an employment that has caused their problem. Do you understand? I don't agree with that. Why do you think there are street hawkers the ones that are perpetrating this? There's a cut here, that's what I said. I don't think necessarily the street hawkers have anything to do with it. I know the ones on the highway. Those ones on the highway. But internally... No, the ones that work within streets are not talking about highway or cars. So I think this is an ambitious cycle. For every chaos you see there are key stakeholders that have benefited from it. Because they are benefiting from it they are not going to stop it. Now if I decide to vandalize the bridge and I remove some materials that are there that means you have somebody who will be allocated a project and will be funded what billions of Naira to pull those things back, to buy new materials. Now if I'm the one who is in charge of that I want that project to come to me. So that means if I put this today in the next one month I'm going to send someone back there and take it off. Now if you take it off and I mean the good graces of people who are releasing those funds they are going to allocate that project back to me. So at the end of the day I am taking my materials back I am putting it back I am not spending a dime. And that's how these things work. Even the beggars that we complain about sometimes I heard that they have like a syndicate you try to remove one beggar from the road. In the next two weeks that beggar is back on the road. Not because they don't want to but because they have people who are in charge of that. And then no one is making money from it. Sorry let me also quickly say that outside of government's infrastructure even for I mean we have big corporations you know like Telcos NEPA and Electricity and all that what people do not understand is when you vandalise these things the cost of it comes back to the consumers because energy companies they are not going to keep they are in business so when there is some kind of vandalism they are forced to rebuild or repair or as long as they are spending this money we bear the cost of that it's just common sense so when you think that you are so hungry or you are so poor to the point that you want to vandalise I'll give you an example when the Nairobi design thing happened and then people went and they were destroying banks I mean what sense is that in destroying and eating now those communities are suffering what do you think is going to happen when a bank comes into that community first of all they are going to be hostile to the people in that community they probably won't give you good service some of them have not recovered exactly, because of those states when the xenophobic what's it called opera happened at the mall till tomorrow some of the stores never recovered now for you to be able to buy certain things you have to drive along mile and I saw the people in that community going to still televisions it was free for all free money, free this, free that here uncle uncle mall has not recovered uncle mall I think it's about I think it's about three times they have even been because they did the xenophobic they did the answers so it's almost like a lot of business did not recover from it so it's a ripple and a very vicious effect so the impact but that's why I'm saying that how do we solve the problem because again let us also treat it from the root what I am saying is that those cartels is what you should target you can't be targeting those people those people are just symptoms what you are seeing on the streets because as long as those syndicates exist and these people they can be fished out it's not like the government cannot identify them have you tried to see whether a policeman knows your address or not just try to be in their bad books you will know that they know your address even down to your hometown that's how good the police system is so it's truly that the government is really serious about curbing these things so that we can move forward because what I see is retrogression like Loma said we are actually retrogressing because there is no progress for every single time you look through the budget of our country you keep on seeing repetitive allocations why because something you understand that they have done before they are doing it again it's repetitive allocation so imagine if we start to say that's why you notice that since they started all these estated properties where you are living in an estate you see that there is a bit of sanity when it comes to living conditions of people because before it was like that as well but now because all these estated buildings they have personal security so it costs a lot because yesterday they said they had deployed some surveillance on the Niger bridge going forward and all of that they had deployed surveillance and all of that it goes beyond surveillance outside of surveillance the people that you have caught what have they been done to them so look at the allocation that is given to for instance I think it's an obscene amount of money just because he needs to protect the oil pipelines who are the people attacking and vandalizing the oil pipelines so you see this thing like you rightly said chaos even inside all the transactions that happened with Boko Haram and all of that there were people that were benefitted from it so as long as we continue to have benefactors of some of all these chaos it will continue to happen so anybody that tells me that they are serious with us as a country moving forward I need to see some level of strong measures because you know what they know how to identify these people they can get them if they want to but they are choosing not to get them because again that is almost sometimes in my head I don't settle you today or day but at the cost of who because now we suffer of course why can't we know you see just to buttress your point if you look at my what's in news and you look at those amounts those billions what will it take to buy camera how much is camera I don't know if you understand what I'm saying how much is camera but because they know that having a camera there will give real time but they won't do that let me even tell you why can't that not be part of your budget I would be satisfied if I see allocations security surveillance all those let me tell you she just nailed that's what I'm saying that's what she said because that's the reason why it won't work the one that happened at Toa Gaten that we saw live from there let me even tell you gainful employment so when you have employed like all these neighborhood watch now where they got stayed employed how much did they pay them a salary do you understand what I'm saying let me tell you something if you calculate how much these street hawkers are making jumping up and down a lot of them have lost their lives trying to sell one bottle of water do you understand what I'm saying so you need to first of all give them value for value so if I tell you that I want to take you off the street what are the alternative solutions those are real empowerment for me so if you say between a long bridge and this whatever there's always chaos here happening so let's employ them let them become the watchdog and pay them a decent salary give them clean uniform give them a patroca but it's too much for me to ask but whoever wants to stay on that list absolutely the employees at the airport hi you just cut out my points it's true but the employees too because they believe that the people we buy back from them to guess what their money they have a click on that note we can't find the solution we have to bring the people to come and tell us what they have in mind thank you so much ladies now before we go I assure you follow us across all our social media handings at Weshaw Africa you can interact with us further most importantly follow all our engagements on social media like share and write to families and friends to watch and follow the conversation this is our quote for today infrastructure is the backbone of every economic growth it improves access to basic services such as clean water and electricity creates jobs and boost businesses so we are suffering job insufficient job is because again we are also vandalizing some of our infrastructure so imagine if we really flip the coin we will see you guys tomorrow bring another great conversation to your screen