| Summary/Abstract |
This article draws on in-depth fieldwork in Lagos, Nigeria, to explain the changing role of motor-park touts (agberos) in urban transport. Situating the emergence of agberos within the insecurity and radical uncertainty caused by the structural adjustment programme of the 1980s, this article explains the transformation of agberos in the light of their tacit incorporation into the National Union of Road Transport Workers, which politicized and altered their role in urban transport. It further argues that current efforts to rid motor-parks of agberos is inspired by the post-1999 urban renewal project of the Lagos State Government to transform Lagos into a ‘world class’ megacity. Yet, the embedded role of ‘big politics’ (i.e. the strategic alliance between the union and the state) helps to explain the difficulty of doing away with agberos in Lagos. By focusing on their changing role in Lagos, this article foregrounds the critical and mediating role of agberos in the day-to-day management of urban public transport, while illuminating the politics of violent patronage and extortion rackets in which they are popularly implicated.
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