The Lagos Irony

Crusoe Osagie writes about the recent visible infrastructure transformation of Lagos in the midst of palpable human chaos

They call it the city that never sleeps, the commercial heartbeat of Lagos, the restless engine room of Nigeria. Yet for those of us who have resided and worked here for nearly three decades, loving it in all its defiance and chaos, there is a painful truth that sits heavily on the chest: Lagos may well be the most expensive slum in the world.

It hurts to admit this as a Lagosian by residence. But attempt to acquire property in Ikoyi, Ikeja GRA, Lekki, Banana Island, or even in Ifako, Oshodi, Iyana Ipaja—names that stretch across the social spectrum of the city—and you will find yourself wondering what part of the globe you are standing in. The prices are outrageous, almost surreal. What once seemed ambitious now feels impossible. It has become so absurd that price tags are frequently quoted in United States Dollars, as though the soil beneath our feet were anchored somewhere far beyond the Atlantic.

Yet take a deliberate walk through one of the so-called high-profile neighborhoods of Ikoyi, and the illusion begins to crack.

Start at Keffi Street junction on Awolowo Road and stroll toward the prestigious Ikoyi Club 1938, as it is proudly styled. Before the grandeur of exclusivity registers in your mind, something else meets you first: the smell. It is difficult to describe without wincing. A repulsive blend rises into the air—a stagnant canal’s sour breath mingling with raw sewage, decomposing food waste, and the harsh fumes exuding from poorly managed motorbikes, tricycles, trucks, and commuter buses. It strikes without warning, knocking the composure out of you. The shock is even sharper if you have been away from the city for some time, as though your senses had briefly forgotten how to defend themselves.

As you struggle to steady yourself against this invisible assault, another reality emerges. A significant number of the people walking the streets appear destitute, some visibly unwell, some mentally distressed. Poverty and wealth stand shoulder to shoulder here, separated only by walls and security gates. It might have been easier to digest if everyone moved quietly about their business, but Lagos rarely grants such distance. Many step directly into your space, whispering requests, eyes searching yours for acknowledgment, for alms, for something—anything—that might shift the balance of their day.

And so the contradiction deepens. Million-dollar properties rise above open drains. Luxury cars glide past refuse-clogged canals. Dollar-denominated rent stands guard over streets that still struggle with basic sanitation. Lagos dazzles and disappoints in the same breath. It flaunts affluence while wrestling with decay.

To love Lagos is to live with this tension—to celebrate its resilience, its energy, its boundless entrepreneurial spirit—while mourning the glaring disparities that refuse to be hidden. It is a city of ambition built atop unresolved fundamentals. A place where price does not always match value, where cost soars while infrastructure strains.

And perhaps that is what makes the reality so painful. Not that Lagos is imperfect—no great city is—but that its promise feels perpetually within reach, yet just out of grasp.

Pillars in the dirt

There is something deeply ironic about the new concrete veins stretching across Lagos.

They rise like monuments to ambition — bold, sweeping, unapologetically modern. Flyovers arc across the skyline, bridges stitch neighborhoods together, and road expansions announce that this city intends to compete with the world. From the restless orbit of Computer Village toward Cele, the elevated highway lifts you above the grinding traffic, above Danfos and horns, and for a brief, intoxicating moment, Lagos feels engineered — orderly, intentional, almost futuristic.

But the irony waits beneath the bridge.

Around Allen Avenue and Opebi, excavators carve the earth with mechanical confidence. New link roads emerge. Familiar junctions dissolve. For those who have known this city for decades, memory struggles to keep pace with construction. Lagos is remapping itself in reinforced concrete.

Begin at the Radisson Blu Hotel on Isaac John Street in Ikeja GRA. The lawns are trimmed but the road-side pavements are missing slabs at intervals from where offensive fumes gush uncontrollably. Glass towers mirror ambition but numerous passersby seem to move without direction. Here, Lagos appears curated and chaotic at the same time. Move toward Mobolaji Bank Anthony Way, edge past the Sheraton Lagos Hotel, and drift into Opebi, Allen Avenue, and Awolowo Way. God save you if you are on foot, though the distance is short, the path is littered with human waste.

The contradiction is vast. For all the billions poured into elevated roads, there are no proper walkways for the people who live beside them. Pedestrians step into traffic because the city has given them no alternative. Drainage systems sit open. Human waste dots the margins of freshly paved corridors. The scent of open defecation competes with petrol fumes and roasted corn. Development rises vertically while basic sanitation remains horizontal — and neglected.

Under the majestic flyovers, another Lagos thrives — not by design, but by necessity. Concrete pillars become anchors for tarpaulin shelters. Bridge undersides become bedrooms. Dividers become kitchens. Entire communities form in the shadows of infrastructure meant to accelerate movement. People cook, bathe, argue, trade, and sleep beneath structures that cost billions to construct.

The roads are imposing.

The society around them is improvised.

Men clutching wads of cash still hover near traffic lights and hotel gates, whispering “Dollar?” Informal currency exchange flourishes beneath formal ambition. Order is performed above; survival is negotiated below.

This is the present-day Lagos paradox: architectural confidence rising from social fragility.

The city cannot remain horizontal — it must build upward. A megacity swelling at the seams needs bridges, expansions, and arterial roads. Infrastructure is not a luxury; it is survival. Yet infrastructure without planning for human dignity becomes spectacle. It becomes sculpture — impressive, photographed, inaugurated — but disconnected from the lived reality at its base.

What does it mean to erect gleaming flyovers in a city where pedestrians have nowhere safe to walk?
What does progress look like when human defecation stains the margins of billion-naira projects?
What kind of modernization allows homelessness to root itself permanently beneath its grandest achievements?

Lagos today is a split-screen city. One half beams with momentum, steel, and policy-driven ambition. The other half improvises existence in the gaps — unsheltered, unsanitary, unplanned.

The tragedy is not that Lagos is building. It must build.

The tragedy is that concrete is rising faster than coordination. That bridges are engineered with precision while the society around them remains structurally adrift. That the imposing roads and flyovers cast long shadows — and in those shadows, thousands live entire lives.

Lagos is reaching for the future with magnificent concrete hands.

But beneath those hands, many are still standing barefoot on broken ground.

With all these sophistication and dysfunction about Lagos identified, it would be counterproductive to end this piece without some advice to those whose duty it is to present this sprawling city to tourists and visitors as the enigma that it is supposed to be. First, it is only fair to note that Lagos is an unfortunate victim of the challenge of poverty that ravages the entire Nigeria. Wherever you may be in the country, once you reckon that life is not delivering to you what you consider your fair share, one of the first options that crosses your mind is to find your way to Lagos or Abuja, where most of the national cake is presumably being distributed.

This leaves Lagos with the perpetual problem of dealing with an extremely dynamic population size. But Lagos must find a way to keep up with its peers in Africa like Accra, Cotonou, Johannesburg and others which certainly have similar challenges but manage to keep their cities planned, organized and impressive to sophisticated tourists from around the world.

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