Why Good Driving Etiquette Will Save Your Life

There are some driving etiquette that Nigerians fail to observe driving in Lagos. Below are some of the bad driving etiquette we exhibit.

Tailgate: is when you drive bumper to bumper to the point of sometimes hitting the car in front of you. As usual when this happens, we wave our hands to say sorry and all is well. I wish I could solve all problems in life this way!

Honk: It seems almost impossible to drive from point A to point B without hearing people honking excessively and unnecessarily. It makes me feel like if you haven’t honked your horn in Lagos you haven’t driven.

Driving while texting: This one is so rampant. We are taught not to drive while distracted but we do anyway. It is important to add that this is not peculiar to Nigerians.

Let others merge: In driving school I learnt that “courteous driving consists of allowing other motorists to merge into traffic by giving them the space to do so.” This would be an alien thing in Nigeria.

I was driving in Lagos one day when a lady driving in another car exited a bridge to join my lane. It prompted me to slow down and let her merge in front of me. She showed her appreciation by waving to say thank you.

Along the route, she changed lane to the lane on my left and we were driving almost side by side. I got a little ahead of her as traffic started to build up. Then I noticed that the vehicle in front of me had broken down,  I signaled to let the driver in front of her know that I wanted to change lanes  but he drove aggressively bumper to bumper to the car in front of him. I tried to wave at him to get his attention, but he was having none of it.

I thought to myself, no problem, I just let the lady behind you to get ahead of me less than 5 minutes ago, I am sure she will let me get in front of her. But to my dismay, the woman started driving bumper to bumper with the car in front of her. Any attempt to get her attention was rebuffed as she just stared straight ahead pretending like she could not see me trying to get her attention.

Luckily the car behind her allowed me to change lane. So right after she passed the car that broke down, she switched to the lane to the right, and I followed behind her. We got to a red light and she stopped, and I stopped behind her.

If you have driven in Lagos you will know that people tend to blow through the red light. And as soon as the light shows yellow the drivers waiting at the red light immediate begin to drive. So, if one person is blowing through the light as it turns red and the other is blowing through the yellow light about to turn green, accident is inevitable.

Although the woman in front of me waited for the light to turn green before she moved, the man on the other side, ran through the light as it turned red and instantly slammed into the vehicle of the woman in front of me.

I quickly went around her and the first thing that went through my mind was, I hope she is okay. Then I thanked God that she her lack of driving etiquette saved me from an accident. The last thing that went through my mind was I hope she has insurance because that damage looks like it’s going to be a total loss because I doubt abeg go fit solve this one oh.

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