URBANISM SATIRE SERIES
We are all poor in this country—some just have better lighting, prettier curtains, gym memberships, and louder generators.
IN Lagos, suffering has evolved.
It no longer looks distressed.
It looks successful.
It lives on the Island; inside shiny buildings squeezed tightly together like loaves of bread in a hot oven.
Expensive.
Airless.
Proudly advertised as luxury.
There is barely space to breathe, but just enough room to reverse an SUV🚔 and inflate self-esteem.
Here, wealth is not about comfort.
It is about appearance.
In 2026, residents of elite neighbourhoods still bathe with tightly sealed mouths. Tap water exists—but mostly as décor. Bottled water is the real infrastructure. Typhoid and cholera, thankfully, respect no postcode.
Electricity follows the same logic. Public power is unreliable, but generators and inverters are loyal. They roar through the night—providing light, noise, fumes, and emotional reassurance.
Nigeria struggles to generate 8,000 megawatts of electricity; an amount some single factories abroad produce alone.
But we compensate with confidence, extension cords, and the bold belief that industrialisation will sort itself out.
Health🚑
Gym culture has also caught up. Not strictly for fitness—but for optics.
To be seen.
To belong.
Meanwhile, primary healthcare still lags behind, unevenly distributed and strangely absent in so-called elite areas.
Healthcare itself remains an adventure.
An emergency is a test of faith—and traffic patience.
Ambulances 🚑crawl.
Time leaks away.
Wealth can pay hospital bills, but it cannot buy urgency.
Then come the celebrations.
Attend a society wedding👩❤️💋👨 and you would think it is a competition—not of love, but of capacity.
Who shared more souvenirs.
Who fed guests more excessively.
Who proved, beyond doubt, that my house is bigger than yours?.
The couple leaves the altar smiling—and steps straight into financial reality.
At night, the city glows. Lounges and clubs sparkle. A platter of food sells for ₦3 million. A bottle of cognac 🍾goes for $5,000—in a country where the minimum wage struggles to reach $65 a month.
This is not enjoyment.
It is performance art.!
We spend like Saudi princes.👳🏽♂️
Cruise yachts like Mediterranean billionaires.🚄
Fly private jets like oil sheikhs.🛩️
All in a country of over 200 million people with a GDP smaller than Singapore’s six million. Perspective did not make the guest list.
And yet, the greatest luxury is silence!.😐
Instead of concern, there is pride.
Instead of advocacy, there is display.
We admire suffering in suits.
We celebrate hardship with aesthetics.
We confuse coping with comfort—and survival with success.
The truth is simple and uncomfortable:
We are all poor in this country—some just have better lighting, prettier curtains, gym memberships, and louder generators.
So I ask:
Why can’t I walk freely on a sidewalk?🏃🏿
Why must I keep seeing murky, stinking, overflowing drains?😳
Why must I cover my nose because of fumes and polluted air everywhere?🫢
I beg, these things are doable.
But only if those in charge are willing to listen.
Me, I don’t talk my own too much sha…🤷🏾♂️
I dey wait for una for 2027.😂
Moral of the Satire
▪︎ Be intentional about providing the basic necessities that make life truly comfortable.
▪︎ The societies we copy did not start with luxury—they started with functioning basics.