agos needs to start doing something about the filths ravaging its streets and surroundings to avoid catastrophic epidemic. Everywhere you go to in Lagos is like arriving at a refuse dump. As such it is surprising to learn that Lagos was not ranked among the top ten dirtiest cities in the world. Instead, cities like New Delhi, Karachi, Lima, Dakar, Accra were included while back home in Nigeria, Onitsha, Aba, Kaduna, Ife completed the list without a mention of Lagos. If this be the case, and judging from what I've observed, then it is not out of place to say that Nigeria as a whole is engulfed in a culture of dirtiness and living in the ocean of filth. This is no exaggeration! You just need to travel the length and breadth of the country to see things for yourself.

But I am focusing on Lagos because of the way residents and the state authorities make reference to the city as the center of excellence. What is excellent about Lagos, if I may ask? Is it the floating slum in Makoko, ghettos all over mainland, garbage filled Alaba market as you find in other local shopping places; or in short, the lack of sewage and drainage system all over the city? I have always wondered on what basis such judgement was made.

A youtuber recently gave his assessment of Lagos where he lamented that the one greatest problem of the city is the question of waste disposal facilities. People pee and poop anywhere and everywhere on the street. Drainages are clogged with refuse. Most apartment buildings known as the face-me-I-face-you, especially in the mainland where over 70% of the population reside have only one toilet serving more than 12 tenants who may also be living with their families. If you imagine that Lagos itself is a microcosm of what goes on in the entire country, then you will come to understand the magnitude of the problem. Even places like Banana Island, Victoria Island, Lekki and Ikoyi do not score better when it comes to cleanliness. Propaganda adverts by developers such as realtors notwithstanding, the reality is that there is nothing to write home about in these overhyped and overpriced districts of Lagos despite making people think it is an exclusive and luxurious part of the state. They even want to promote and make things look more attractive by saying that Banana Island is ocean view located but anybody can see that the referred water itself is black and dirty, unlike the clear and bluish water you will find in other parts of the world.

My personal experience while travelling within Lagos lends credence to the youtuber's assertion. I once rode on a motorbike from the famous Yaba market to the University of Lagos at Akoka. I was supposed to enjoy fresh air because of the open air ride but guess what I got instead: only smell of rotten bio-waste throughout the twenty minutes journey to the university. The smell becomes worse after a little downpour.

What shocked me the most was when I arrived at the entrance to the University. The heap of rotten garbage where flies and other insects were feasting was more than 2 meters high. The question therefore that comes to mind is this: even if other parts of the city can afford to leave their surrounding so dirty, why should a supposedly high center of learning like a university take dirtiness to higher level? To be honest with you, I was really appalled! Such scene around the university is enough to call for a state of emergency from the university administrators in other climes.

As a result of this experience, I was forced to ask myself where this culture of dirtiness comes from? I want to believe that Africans are not inherently dirty or lack a sense of hygiene. I ask this question because of the ease with which Lagosians carry out their daily activities in such an unhealthy environment with litters dotting the whole places. It is even more surprising that Lagos is a city that produces more millionaires and billionaires in the country than anywhere else. It therefore baffles and defies all logic for people to assume that a clean environment enhances positive mental outlook and optimistic future. Indeed, studies have shown that a clean environment help reduce stress, anxiety and even crime rate.

In Lagos you can hardly find a public park or garden let alone a beautiful one. The one I saw around Anthony Village was simply a joke, and you usually don't see anyone relaxing there except mad people. I don't know if relaxing is not in our culture. Instead, people are busy hopping from one molue to the other.

In the main, one can only conclude that the city was not designed from the onset to give comfort to residents unlike what you find in cities like London, Stockholm, Paris and other European cities but was only designed for the extraction of raw materials for the colonialist and imperial centers. Unfortunately, successive governments after independence have not deemed it fit to redesign and give it the aesthetic of a modern city. This is why at the slightest opportunity politicians and businessmen embezzle money to travel to Europe, Dubai and America either to go and buy a house or in order to experience such comfort, something they can make available at home for everyone to enjoy. You can again imagine what benefit it will bring to the country in terms of tourism and pride in one's country if politicians do the right thing.