A first timer in Abuja would think that Zuba is part of Niger state because it is fused together with Madalla, a ward in Suleja local government area of the state. But it is not. It is in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
The natives of the over-crowded town are Koro by tribe.
It is famous for its fruit market, which allegedly produces more than 60 percent of the fruits consumed in the South, and an ever-bustling vehicle spare parts market.
Unknown to many, natives of the town are rarely involved in fruits or spare parts business. Almost every male in the town, whether young or aged, works as a motor park ‘hustler’, which is popularly known as agbero, to eke out a living.
As axiomatic in the country, agberos are mostly the uneducated or the school drop-outs. In Zuba it is not so; even the educated and the gainfully employed are involved in one way or the other.
“It is like a tradition in this town. We have all sorts of people involved; some people think that agbero is what the jobless and the uneducated are into; in Zuba it is not so. We have degree holders, NCE holders, secondarians and the people working with the government hustling here with us,” Malam Jibrin Bala, 51, who spoke on behalf of the union’s Chairman, who was out of town when our correspondent visited, said.
Bala could no longer remember when he joined the motor park ‘hustling’, “but I believe it is almost 20 years now.”
Though he is still unable to build his own house with the money he gets from the job, he shelters his “family with what I earn here and we live comfortably and my six children are all in good schools, and I don’t delay in paying their school fees.”
Getting to Zuba from the city centre or Gwagwalada, one would be accosted by a horde of young men who are shouting destinations, pointing at the buses lined at a spot called Dankogi.
Agberos in Bala’s age-grade no longer call destinations or look for passengers. We sit down, the young men do that for us, and whatever they get, we have our percentage.”
Kano, Kaduna and Zaria passengers who cannot afford the exorbitant fares charged at Jabi motor park go to Dankogi to board a bus. Any vehicle that loads in the park forfeits one passenger’s money, which is “shared into percentages at the end of, and everybody gets his own. I go home with about N3,000 if am in the evening pit, but less than that in the morning pit; depending on how much is realised.”
‘Pit’ is the time an abgero is given to operate in the park daily.
To corroborate Bala’s claim that all classes of people are in their midst, an agbero, Saminu Usman, 28, told our correspondent that he works in the morning ‘pit’ to get extra money to feed his family.
Usman said he finished NCE in 2011 and has been a teacher with an average salary ever since.
“The money I get from Dankogi is what me, my wife and children feed with; I save my salary for unforeseen circumstances and capital projects,” he said.
When asked if it is not too low for his status as a teacher, he firmly answered: “No, I met my elders in it, and I sponsored myself through school with it. In fact, can you imagine that someone like the Vice Chairman of a local government is among us? He doesn’t stay on the road like us but he used to and till date his percentage goes to him.”
Speaking to our correspondent about the job, the Agwara of Zuba rather hailed his people for earning their living “through such legitimate means”.
The Agwara, who spoke through his Sarkin Pada, said: “You cannot hear that a Zuba boy is a thief or armed robber; the youth go to school side by side going to the roadside to work, so we are always at peace here.”
