The Day They Banned The Mammy Wagons

The roads are lined with their rusting skeletons. Birds in the surrounding bush fall silent when they pass, and drivers of lesser vehicles pull over to the side in terror. In all of West Africa there is no more frightening sight than a herd of wide-open mammy wagons, stuffed to the rafters with merchants, housewives, babies, calabashes and live chickens, careening toward the next town at full stampede.

Hope & Challenge. Nor is there any more common sight. Mammy wagons, named for the bright-robed market women who ride them and driven by tough freewheelers appropriately known as "maulers," are West Africa's principal means of travel. Usually ancient pickup trucks fitted out with wooden roofs and benches, they hide their precarious mechanical condition under garishly painted hoods. Their cabs often bear a motto full of hope ("God Never Sleeps"), African fatalism ("No Condition Is Permanent"), challenge ("Let Me Try Again"), or simple pious appeal ("Amen").

So low are their rates (average fare from one town to the next: 12-c-) that the maulers refuse to move until every seat is filled--then stop at nothing in order to beat the competition for the passengers waiting in the next town. Ignoring traffic laws, they steam down the center of narrow highways at 60 m.p.h. or more, bully their way through city traffic by such tactics as pulling into the path of oncoming cars, cut across traffic lanes at will to stop for passengers. Yet they are part of the very fabric of society, and last week, when the Lagos city council ordered police to enforce laws banning them from the capital's clogged streets, the maulers and their mammy wagons became the heroes of all Nigeria.

Jeering & Footsore. The city's idea was to turn the business over to the municipal bus system, which, as it turned out, had far too few vehicles to handle the trade. The ban stranded thousands of commuters who had no other way to get to work. Lagos' streets were immediately jammed with baby-toting mammies lugging pails of smoked fish, fu-fu rolls and other pungently perishable delicacies to market in the 100DEG heat. The pedestrians were the only things moving. Angry maulers used their mammy wagons to blockade all entrances to the city, slashed the tires of the big municipal buses and pulled them across downtown intersections. The result was a monstrous traffic jam that completely paralyzed traffic for nine sweltering, swearing hours.

When police, using riot gas and billy clubs, tried to clear the streets, their way was blocked by jeering, footsore mobs--who promptly moved back into place every bus the cops succeeded in pushing off the road. Finally, the army was called out, but its troops proved no more effective: the only way they could get from one riot to another was by helicopter. Faced with absolute chaos, the city council took the only possible step: it humbly rescinded its order and opened the streets once again to' the savage fleet. ,

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