By Agbeze Ireke Kalu Onuma
I live in Lagos. I live in the Lekki-Epe Expressway suburb of Abijo GRA – a rapidly expanding corridor that stretches from the chaotic bottleneck of Ajah all the way down to the relative quiet of Epe. If you know this axis, you know it has become a microcosm of the Nigerian contradiction over the last decade.
It is a landscape dotted with sprawling, gated estates boasting grand architectural ambitions, sitting cheek-by-jowl with overcrowded neighborhoods, makeshift shacks, roadside businesses, schools, and markets. Construction cranes sit beside wooden kiosks. Luxury apartments rise beside zinc-roofed homes. We are a community of extreme contrasts, separated by high walls and electric fences, yet bound together by the restless, ambitious pulse of Lagos itself.
And yet, for all its growth and visible prosperity, one basic thing has quietly disappeared from our lives here since November 2025.
Light. Sustained, reliable electricity. The kind that allows you to switch on a bulb and expect it to remain on.
Whole swathes of streets, communities, and estates – mine included – have simply not known what it feels like to have sustained supply. Not reduced electricity. Not unstable electricity. Almost none at all. We have been plunged into a darkness so thick and persistent that it has…
