MY TEN KOBO; LAGOS@50,OR LAGOS STATE@50?

This is purely an academic exercise.

It does not take away anything from the celebrations lined up to mark 50 years of the creation of Lagos State on May 27, 1967.

As I drove into town yesterday, I saw a lot of posters lining up the median of major roads, proudly proclaiming Lagos at 50.

And this got me thinking :Should it be Lagos at 50, or Lagos state at 50?

I know that Lagos, both as a colony and as a Federal Capital, had boundaries that were definitive and clear cut, from 1860 till 1967.
I am also aware that the boundary was at Yaba, and that the present Lekki axis was deep in the old Western region.

So, it is incontestable that Lagos in this context is over 150 years old as an administrative entity.

That means that about 70 percent of what now constitute Lagos State were not part of Lagos until 50 years ago.

In that context, should the programme be tagged Lagos at 50 or Lagos State at 50?

Or was it just shortened for effect, and nothing more?

Which brings me to another cloudy area.

Is Lagos a City State or a megacity?

If it is a megacity, does that include rural parts of the state?

If in years past, the Mayor of Lagos was dealing with the Mayor of London and that of New York as equals, is it advancement or retrogression if present and past governors of a City State now proudly equate themselves with Mayors of cities in other countries instead of with governors of states, in which they have equal equivalency?.

Or am I doing all these because Alhaja Mama Arafat had an early morning appointment that forces me to prepare, feed and take to school, an inquisitive four year old who questions everything?

Happy 50th anniversary, Lagos State. I came to Lagos dripping with blood at the world famous Massey Street Hospital. You gave me succour, an education, mostly free of charge, a livelihood, houses to lay my head,vehicles to move around, and stakeholding in three local governments.

What else can an Ibadan prince ask for?

My Ten Kobo+