My trip to Ilorin

I was travelling from Ibadan to Ilorin far back in August 1999. I boarded a commercial bus at Ojoo Garage Ibadan. The bus took off and had  journeyed for about 15 min. when the driver stopped to ease himself. When he returned to driving a passenger (young woman) said to the driver who is an elderly man “Baba you’ve started again, this is what you did the last time I boarded your vehicle, stopping the vehicle to urinate every now and then pls don’t waste our precious time on this journey”. There was laughter from almost everyone in the bus. In another 20 min. of driving, the driver stopped the vehicle and excuse himself that he wanted to check the back tires of the bus. We realised that he actually went to urinate again. Passengers were reeling with laughter as he resume driving. This spur different level of conversations in the bus. A particular young man started making jibes and comedy on the issue. While this went on Baba stopped again, this time he rushed out of the bus to do his thing. I realised that Baba has a health problem and I didn’t like the way some passengers were turning it to entertainment especially our young man that talks so much about it and made fun of the Baba. Baba maintained his silence. This went on and I lost count of how many times Baba stopped the bus to urinate. It was a very frustrating journey and I wondered why the NURTW (the local body that controls commercial transportation) allowed someone like Baba to engage in this business.