I am the Digital Billboard … Lagos’ most hardworking entertainer. I never rest, never blink, never miss a target. I am the unofficial minister of distraction, the patron saint of roadside confusion. From Ikeja to Lekki, from Ojota to Orile, I hang proudly across expressways like a giant screen in a citywide cinema.
But here’s the joke, dear Lagosians; your highways are not cinemas. Yet every day, you drive through my movie.
Once, my ancestors were quiet storytellers… ‘Drink Maltina’, ‘Vote Progress’, ‘Jesus Saves’. They stood with dignity, slightly crooked, fading under the sun but honest in their stillness. Now, I and my cousins are restless and luminous — flashing, scrolling, winking, seducing. I sell everything: soap, sermons, cement, salvation, and politicians; all in thirty-second intervals.
They say Lagos never sleeps; I say, Lagos never blinks. Not when I’m around.
Every 20 metres, another of my relatives rises, a screen, a banner, a pole … sometimes even mounted on solar lights meant to guide you home. Now, those same poles preach brand messages louder than the lamp’s own glow. The city’s night sky looks like a disco ball of capitalism… as you can see in New York’s Time Square.
But I must confess, sometimes even I get scared of myself. I see drivers craning their necks to admire my moving images on Third Mainland Bridge — a 10-ton LED spectacle in the middle of rush-hour chaos. One second of wonder, one swerve of distraction, and someone’s destiny meets an airbag. And for what? To know that a new drink “refreshes your hustle”?
They say we billboards make Lagos vibrant. True — but we also make it vulnerable and risky.
Some of us sway dangerously in the wind, our metal frames corroded by neglect, our bolts loose like politicians’ promises. One storm, and boom … your next breaking news headline.
Yet, no one checks us. No one audits our structure. LASAA yawns, LAMATA looks away, and the city blinks blindly under our neon sermons.
We’ve colonized every pole, every bridge, every skyline. Even the lamp posts, whose duty was illumination, are now enslaved by our propaganda. Lagos has turned from Centre of Excellence to Billboard Republic.
You call it innovation. I call it impunity.
And here’s the ultimate irony: while homes go dark at night, I remain lit — powered by diesel generators humming beneath me. I glow while you grope. I dazzle while your children sweat in darkness.
But Lagosians, I’m only what you’ve made me. You feed me contracts, you ignore my danger, you worship my glow. You’ve turned public space into private greed, and visibility into vanity.
Moral of the Satire
▪︎When a city starts glowing more than it grows, its light becomes a liability.
▪︎Regulation is not oppression — it’s protection.
▪︎ Moderation in everything is good.
▪︎Set out and enforce the allowable density of Billboards per space
▪︎ Digital Billboards across highways can be distracting and therefore dangerous.
Gbenga Onabanjo.
GO-FORTE FOUNDATION
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