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People love coastlines, and I'm no exception. There is an inherent drama to the places where the land meets the sea, like Point Reyes National Seashore, just north of San Francisco, which is where I recorded these sounds years ago. I love being in this place, right on the edge of the continent, with all of North America behind me and all of the vast Pacific Ocean in front of me. Humans have always been drawn to coastlines for all kinds of economic and cultural
reasons. We've traveled along them for migration and trade. We've hunted and fished in coastal waters, and we've built communities, including some of the world's biggest cities, in these dynamic, beautiful zones of contrast and possibility. But the climate crisis is changing what it means to live next to the ocean. Even if we keep warming to 1.5 degrees average, sea levels at the end of this century will be about a foot higher than they were in the year 2000. That's roughly a
third of a meter. But that's an optimistic guess. We could be in for six feet or two meters of sea level rise or more. And that leads to all kinds of questions, where are all of the people who live on the coasts gonna go? How do we build or maintain infrastructure in a world where the shoreline keeps changing? These questions are not at all theoretical. Coastal communities all over the world are facing them right now, and this is one
of the most challenging aspects of the climate crisis. Even as we try to lower emissions and limit future temperature rise, we also have to deal with the warming that's already happening. In climate speak, these two things are called mitigation and adaptation, and one of the places where you can see the need for both of them simultaneously is in Lagos, the largest city in Nigeria and one of the most important ports in
Africa. Lagos is flourishing in many ways. There's a booming entertainment industry, it's a hub for authors, but it's also facing huge problems as the world warms and the ocean increasingly encroaches on the city. We're going to spend this whole episode in Lagos, examining two very different responses to the challenges of sea level rise. Welcome to Threshold. I'm Amy Martin, and I'm excited to introduce you to
reporter Shola Lawal. She's from Nigeria, she's worked for the New York Times, The Guardian, Deutsche Welle in Germany, and she's going to be our guide for this journey in Lagos. Hi. Shola!
Hi.
So you've lived in Lagos for like, 10 years, but you're not actually from the city, right?
No, I'm actually from a much smaller city. It's towards the north. It's not on the coast, for sure. I actually I moved here to Lagos when I was 16.
And what was that like for you to arrive in this gigantic city. What do you remember from your first days in Lagos?
Well, I remember feeling like someone had kind of hit the fast forward button. People here rush a lot, and I just, I was trying to, you know, take everything in. And I remember that I just kept looking at the way that people would move. People were so animated, you know, I wanted to see the look on everybody's face, but they were moving so fast. And the buildings, I remember, the buildings, were so tall to me back then, because I'm from much smaller city. We
don't have that many buildings. Basically everything looked like a movie, you know. And I wanted to take it all in at once, which was, of course, impossible, but definitely it was interesting, overwhelming and exciting.
Well, I've been looking at Lagos on Google Maps a lot lately, and it has a really interesting layout. It almost looks like it's kind of been built on islands. Is that right?
Kind of. So Lagos is basically split between the mainland and the island. It's a case of two cities, really. The mainland is where a lot of middle income workers leave because it's much cheaper than the island. And then there's a bridge that connects the mainland to the island. The island, of course, is where, you know, all the high earners leave and work. And it's also where the business district of Lagos is, so you see a lot of offices there.
So, sorry to impose a US context here, but is it sort of like the island is Manhattan and the mainland is more Brooklyn, Bronx kind of?
Kind of, I would say, yeah, very similar.
And it sounds like there's water just everywhere.
There is water everywhere because, of course, Lagos Island implies that there's water everywhere, but there's also water because of the constant rains Lagos climate. It has two rainy seasons, so there's lots and lots of water. So this is something that I recorded last summer, it was the rainy season in Nigeria, I was driving through the city during a very heavy downpour. It's raining like crazy today in Lagos, and everywhere is flooded in front of me, honestly, I see school kids coming back from
school. It's around 3pm and they have their school sandals off, and they're just walking in the water because the waters are so high at this point, everyone is like pulling their trousers or pulling their dresses off. Cars are really struggling to pass through this sea of a road, and the water really comes pretty close to the door handle of a normal sedan.
So that sounds kind of scary.
It was a little scary. Maybe, you know, very scary, but it's also completely an ordinary experience in Lagos. You know, Lagos has a really poor drainage system, so streets and buildings get flooded all the time. And when you add the rising seas to the mix, you realize that Lagos is actually disappearing. The coast right now is already eroding.
So there's less land, but more and more people, right? I keep hearing about how Lagos is growing.
That is correct. The greater Lagos area has about 20 million people, and more people are coming in all of the time. I mean, something like 2000 people move to the city every week, just from other parts of Nigeria, and then there are more people coming in from neighboring countries, people coming in for work, people coming in for business. Real estate prices, of course, because of this, are really expensive, really sort of way out of reach for a lot of
people. So folks are kind of living just wherever they can. They're building informal communities without basic infrastructure just to survive and make sure that they stay in the city.
And you spent time in one of those communities as part of your reporting for this season, yeah?
That is correct. I actually went to two communities in Lagos, one very poor and one very, not. Two very different ways of building that they have, building more livable spaces and living with sea level rise at the same time.
All right, well, I'm really excited to go on this journey with you. Before I hand you the rains fully here, can you just tell us the names of these two communities so we can kind of get oriented.
Of course. So the first place that we're going to go is called Makoko. It's one of the informal communities that I was just describing to you while the second one is called Eko Atlantic City, and it's the opposite of informal. It's a in a brand new part of Lagos. It's very neat, it's very tidy, it's very organized. It's very the opposite of Lagos.
Okay, ladies and gentlemen, I am delighted to leave you with Shola Lawal for an adventure in Lagos, Nigeria.
Nigeria needs something like this to bolster its image.
Every country is vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. However, the poorer people in every country are more vulnerable than rich people.
Our vision is to create modern, thriving, inclusive, beautiful settlements.
You don't have to have 100% certainty that X is going to happen Y time to know that it's a threat.
I'm walking through a part of Lagos I've never visited before it's lively and chaotic and congested. This is Makoko, and around me, I see women on motorcycles trying to get around. I see women selling fish, smoked fish, likely caught from the Lagos lagoon.
Makoko is what many people would call a slum. It's an informal community where residents have very little when it comes to material possessions or security, but they do have something many lagosians don't: a potential solution to rising sea levels, while the rest of Lagos is in a constant battle with water, people here are learning to live with it, and I mean that quite literally. Half of the homes in Makoko aren't on land at all. They're built on stilts on the Lagos lagoon.
So I'm currently waiting on the street. For my fixer, Dennis, to join me, and he will take me hopefully to the floating community itself. Hello. Dennis just joined me. My guide to Makoko is Dennis Hounkani. He's lived here all his life, and knows the community inside and out. He and I speak Yoruba together. It's one of the main native languages of Nigeria. So I was just talking to Dennis about where he grew up. He says he was born right on the water. And that he is basically a fish.
As Dennis and I walk toward the water's edge, lots of little kids skip in and out of the wooden homes. Some of the houses here are three stories tall. The colors faded from pinks and blues into a smoky black. There's lots and lots of water now, even in between the houses to see women cooking, lots of children around, some of them in their school uniforms because school just closed. People have lived in Makoko since at least the 19th century,
and fishing has always been at the center of life here. There's a huge fish market in the community, and the people of Makoko sell fish in markets in other parts of Lagos too. Oh, lots of fish smoking places, lots and lots of fish. There's so much fish here. Looks delicious, really. These houses are tiny. It's hard to know how many people actually live here. People here are crammed together in tight quarters. From any one
Estimates place it between 40,000 to 300,000 people. That range is so wide because there's never been an official census. apartment, you can hear the conversations going on in It's a community that grows and changes all the time. neighboring houses. We walk through row after row of small houses on swampy land, and I know I'm getting close to the water when I start to see houses on short stilts, and when my feet start to sink deeper into the ground as I walk.
So now we are approaching the water community itself. We've arrived at the edge of the Lagos lagoon. It's a big pool of water, 50 kilometers long, protected from the full force of the Atlantic Ocean by a long sand spit. So just to try to describe the houses, they are on stilts, just rising above the lagoon. Lagoon is dark, murky, and the houses are just floating above it. Dozens of teenage boys are paddling wooden boats between the rows of houses that appear to float on the water. The boys
are like cabbies. They know where everybody lives, and they take you where you want to go for a small fee. So we are at the waterfront now. Oh, I think we're about to get into a boat. Dennis helps me into a wooden canoe that dips from side to side as I step in. Okay, yes, successful. Okay, I'm on the water now. There's people selling food on the water, like in their boats, tomatoes, rice. Lots of women on boats. Women are quite enterprising in the
community. There's a boat beside me with lots of fish. I think a fisherwoman just came back. I struggle to find my balance while all around me, tiny kids, women with mountains of smoked fish to sell and young girls out to sell groceries expertly navigate the waters. Makoko is a tangle of waterways as busy as any Lagos street. Aah! Collision on sea. I really almost fell into the water just now. Everybody was alarmed.
Building on the water is not necessarily about climate change for people in Makoko, they're doing this because they need somewhere to live, and there's not enough land in Lagos. And it's not that climate change and rising waters don't impact the people of Makoko, but living in homes in the Lagos Lagoon, where water rises and falls throughout the day. Maybe helping them to
prepare for these impacts. They have firsthand lived experience with ever changing sea levels, and they've built their homes on stilts with those changes in mind, they figured out how to trade and move around their community in canoes instead of cars or buses. The people of Makoko are doing what people have done in all kinds of habitats for all of human history, really. They're turning this unlikely place into a home using their resourcefulness and their determination.
In front of me is a house that is being renovated. Dennis introduces me to Michael Fada. Everyone here just calls him Fada. He's a carpenter, and his specialty is building on water. Fada tells me that the trick to building a water house is a very strong foundation. He says he starts with stilts about 12 feet long, which he pounds halfway into the bed of the lagoon. He uses a special wood that doesn't easily rot. It's called 'Kpakpa' in our native Yoruba language.
Fada makes the foundations of the homes, and then people add their own personal touches. Some houses here are painted in bright colors, and others are just plain wood. To build a home here in Makoko, you spend about a million naira. That's around $2,000. It's much cheaper than buying a house in other parts of Lagos. Still in Nigeria, the minimum wage is low. It's the equivalent of about 70 US dollars a month. So spending $2,000 to build a floating home is big money for many people.
Fada says it takes a lot of effort to make the foundations for the floating houses, weeks sometimes, but that effort pays off. He says, houses here can stand for 20 years before collapsing into the lagoon. Still, a lot of basic infrastructure is missing in Makoko. Most people have electricity, but there's no indoor plumbing or proper garbage disposal, and there are no hospitals in the community.
Fada's wife Victoria told me that the difficulty in getting to a health center can actually lead to some very dangerous situations, especially for women. Victoria tells me that it takes a while to paddle a pregnant woman in labor out to government hospitals on the land. Many women have died because of that, she says, and now some are even too scared to have babies. Dennis and I get back into the canoes as we paddle around, I get a strong sense of community,
like everyone knows each other here. People laugh a lot at themselves and at newcomers like me, who cannot find their balance in the canoes, but I also get the feeling that I'm intruding. Many reporters have come here before over the years, flashing big cameras and ready to document life in Makoko. Residents here are tired of it. Now, even though I'm just holding a mic, I see people look at me with distrust, like they're thinking, Oh, it's another outsider coming to see
how poor we are. What else is new? And in some ways, they are right. Even though I live in Lagos, I am kind of shocked by some aspects of life here. The Lagos Lagoon is where a lot of the dirt in Lagos goes. There's garbage and human poop floating all around us. Every hour, the water is supposed to drain out of the lagoon and then get refreshed. But it doesn't seem to actually work that way. The water itself has a smell that I'm not a fan of because it stayed in one place for too
long. The smell sticks to the back of my tongue, making it hard to swallow. Sometimes I hold my breath till I feel lightheaded. There's too much smoke too from all the fish the women are processing. No matter how sunny it is in Lagos, Makoko always has its own foggy ambiance. A lot of people dream about living next to a beautiful, wide open beach, but living right in the water, especially if that water is a
stagnant lagoon, is another thing entirely. It's hard, but it may also be the wave of the future for Lagos, the city has a growing population, limited land area, poor drainage systems and. And a natural tendency to flood when the heavy rains start, as they do every year, in April and in October, the water has nowhere to go.
The cradle of civilization is known to be settled around water in Mesopotamia and cities have always settled around water because of agriculture, infrastructure, transportation.
That's kule Adeyemi, an architect from Lagos. One of Kunle's passions is affordable and sustainable housing, and he says that watching the city struggle with flooding inspired him to design buildings that adapt to nature rather than fight it.
I remember driving around and the entire street was covered, became a river. And it was literally like an epiphany that, wow, many places in Lagos that we think on land actually just very prone to flooding, and they might really just be covered with water. This really triggered my passion for building, not just on land, but also on water.
Kunle researched many different models before realizing that the answer might just be right outside his door in Makoko.
It then occurred to me that people who lived in Makoko were building some of the cheapest dwellings. They have found a way to develop communities and almost a city, and they were building it on water, not land.
People in Makoko are actually at the forefront of an emerging global trend. In the Netherlands, new floating communities are being planned and prototyped. It's also happening in the Maldives and other countries, but Makoko is way past the modeling stage. It's happening, people are leaving this experiment right now, and Kunle has ideas for how to improve it.
By developing infrastructure solutions for managing waste, managing water, clean water. And our vision is to create water cities and develop communities like Makoko into modern, thriving, inclusive and beautiful settlements.
Many of Africa's large cities are on the coast, and in Lagos, half of the population lives within two meters of the sea. That's six feet. In the next 50 years, seas are predicted to rise by a meter here, that would displace about two to three million people here in Lagos alone. But this is definitely not just an African problem. Some version of what's happening to Lagos right now is likely to happen in coastal cities from Bangkok to Miami. So how Lagos deals with climate
change could hold lessons for everyone. Kunle says this inspired him to innovate. He developed a prototype structure for Makoko back in 2012 it was a floating school built right on the water, the first in Africa. The project was praised as a success. The Lagos state government supported it and the United Nations. It made international news and brought a lot of positive attention to Makoko. A bad storm destroyed the school a few years later, but Kunle's company has kept
refining their process. Now they are building floating hubs in other places, in Africa, Asia and Europe, and Kunle wants to come back and do more. In fact, he wants to redesign all of Makoko for the people who live there now. Kunle thinks that with new and better designs, Makoko could be more livable and more pleasing to look at. He even thinks that it could be an attraction for Lagos.
We see Makoko as a place of opportunity and a place that has a lot of history, and we can really think about preserving places like this, enhancing the culture. It's what people do in different parts of world. Why do you go to the floating market in Thailand? What have they got that we don't have? You know, when do we start to recognize our own values, our own assets and and enhance them?
Kunle has worked closely with the community before, and many people in Makoko, especially young residents like my guide, Dennis, love his ideas, but not everyone shares Kunle his vision for Makoko, especially some officials in Lagos state. Most political and business leaders here are eager to sell the city to the world as a place to make deals, shoot movies, plan vacations or meet and mingle with Nigeria's glitterati. Makoko doesn't fit into that
story. From the third mainland bridge, one of the major arteries into downtown Lagos, you can see Makoko below. Brown wooden shacks in a cloud of smoke standing in the murky waters of the lagoon. Instead of seeing a model of resourcefulness and climate adaptation, though, city leaders see an eyesore and an embarrassment for the investors that they want to attract to Lagos.
Investors used to come and visit, and then they used to go and complain. They said, our dwelling houses are shanties and they are spoiling the Third Mainland Bridge.
This is Baale Francis Agonu. He's one of the five chiefs that govern Makoko. His full title is actually Baale Alaase. Baale means chief in Yoruba, and alaase means commander. The Baale tells me that many people came to Makoko from coastal villages in the Benin Republic. It's a small country that borders Nigeria, the migration happened back when there were no colonial borders.
They collected themselves from different areas as fishermen. They came here far back 18th century, while here was swampy, when there was no traces of life.
The Baale says the Lagos royal family unofficially loaned the land around Makoko so the first settlers here so they could live close to the water and fish.
It is waterfront property because we are water bound. We are fishermen and we live on water. Living on water is our main game.
But people here can't prove ownership of Makoko and Lagos authorities want them out. They've tried to get them to vacate the area multiple times already. Their plan is to move the residents to Agbowa, an area some 60 kilometers away. If that happens, residents will have to walk about two miles to get to the water, which means this community of fishing people would have to find a whole new way of life. The Lagos government has even tried to demolish Makoko by force,
sending the police to knock down and clear away houses. The most recent attempt was in 2012. One man died in the confrontation between the community and the security forces. His death got the attention of human rights organizations and forced the government to abandon the idea of removing the settlement, at least temporarily. The men left, but the residents of Makoko live
in constant fear that one day they'll be back. I reached out to the Lagos state urban renewal agency, that's the state department in charge of this case, but they declined to comment. Kunle says that the present state governor of Lagos has shown an interest in his plans, but people are skeptical that the government would actually decide to invest in Makoko, especially since the Lagos authorities have demolished several other informal communities in recent
years. So there's a lot at stake here for a lot of people. If people are forced out of Makoko, the fishermen here will struggle to survive, and Lagosians will struggle too. They'll have fewer fish available to buy, and a lot more people on the streets looking for somewhere to live. Some people here swear to me that they'll resist being shipped to a far off location, being forced away from the water. When I asked Baale what he would like me to tell the authorities, he said, just that
Makoko should not be demolished. With support from the city, he thinks that the people here can survive and thrive, especially as the world heats up.
As you talk about climate change, things are, you know, turning upside down.
Baale says he hears about the flooding plaguing the rest of the city, but it's not something that he's bothered about because of the way his community lives on and with the water.
We don't suffer for all those things. So Makoko, if government can give us peace, we, too can be, you know, ameliorating it by constructing very, very modern houses, floating houses.
Everyone I spoke to in Makoko told me that they want Lagos officials to stop trying to destroy their homes. But there's a split in the community when it comes to Kunle Adeyemi's plans. While the younger generation seems really excited about upgrading this maze of floating shacks into an esthetically pleasing landmark, Baale and the other chiefs aren't so sure. They worry that the architect's ideas could provoke the government to send in the security forces again.
They want to keep quiet and try to stay under the radar. For now, Lagos authorities are focusing elsewhere. They see a lot of opportunities and money in developing pricey residential estates, places for very different types of Lagosians than those who live here on the lagoon. One of them is just 15 short kilometers from Makoko. I'm going to take you there right after this short break.
Hey everybody, this is Erika Janik, Threshold's Managing Editor. Did you know that we have a Threshold newsletter? Our newsletter is a great way to stay connected to Threshold between seasons. Find out what we're thinking about and what we're reading, listening to and watching. So subscribe to the Threshold newsletter today using the link in the show notes or on our website, thresholdpodcast.org.
Okay, it's a very sunny afternoon in Lagos. Welcome back to Threshold. I'm Shola Lawal, and I'm driving down a busy Lagos highway with my sister. This road used to be right on the water's edge, but not anymore. All around me, I can see sand, lots of construction materials. All of this is behind a gated fence that goes for kilometers. I don't know how many kilometers, a lot, I guess. The land we're looking at didn't exist a decade ago. It's brand
new territory made of sand dredged from the ocean. It's as if Lagos has grown a new wing, a new peninsula. And just in the horizon, I can see a number of very tall buildings, very imposing structures, that looks quite, quite far away. This is a Eko Atlantic, a new luxury mini-city. It's big, 10 square kilometers, or about four square miles. I actually used to live near here, back when this land didn't exist, when it was
just open water here. And every day, bit by bit, I saw and heard an endless stream of trucks bringing in sand and stones to build this place. But even though I watched Eko Atlantic emerge from the sea, This building right in front of us. Yes, the third floor. So that used to be my room. And then from there, I would watch as they were like bringing the sand and everything was very I'd never actually gone in there. It's surrounded by interesting, because they used to wake me up at four every
fences, and you can't just come and go freely. I stopped the car morning. Four am every morning, I would wake to that sound. outside the guarded gate to prepare myself and gather the courage to go in. So now I'm going to attempt to go inside Eko Atlantic. They'll probably not let me in, but I'm dressed for the occasion. I have a pink top and pink scarf on. I have my earrings. I look good. Hopefully they'll let me in. Let's see.
Eko Atlantic was designed for a very specific class of people, and as my sister and I drive up to the gate in my noisy blue Toyota Matrix, I'm very aware that I'm not in that class. I'm hoping, though, that I can win the guards over with my charm. Okay, we're approaching the gate. The gate is blue. I see security guards. They're approaching, oh, wow, like, just like at the gate, it feels like we're about to enter Dubai or something. They're looking at me with like, some puzzling it's
like, Who are these ones? Hello, good afternoon. Please, sir, we're just checking, we're just coming to see, we just want to see Eko Atlantic.
It's not allowed, ma'am.
Oh we can't even go to the restaurant?
The restaurant?
Yeah, we'll go now, we'll spend money. The guard gives us a pass that allows us to drive around as long as we don't get out of the car. The first thing I'm struck by is just how huge this new peninsula is. Wow, it's much bigger than I actually thought. The second thing I noticed are the roads. They're pristine. This is definitely like one of the smoothest like layouts in Lagos, because the network here is so good. This is not what Lagos is like at all. Lagos is full of narrow streets are like
potholes everywhere. So this is definitely a different Lagos. Eko Atlantic feels different because it is different. It's a manufactured place. Everything we're looking at, the roads, the buildings, even the land itself, is privately owned. For years, the Atlantic Ocean has been eating away at the Lagos shoreline, and as the climate gets hotter and more unpredictable, the risk of flooding and dangerous storms is
going up. After a particularly bad storm in 2005, the state government ran a contest asking for ideas on how to protect Lagos. The winning design came from a deep pocketed development firm called the Chagoury Group. The city handed over ownership of the area, and the Eko Atlantic city began to emerge. My sister and I are kind of awed by what we see as we drive around. We've watched videos of Eko Atlantic online showing off the million dollar apartments and restaurants, but they didn't
prepare us for how it feels to actually be here. Tarred roads run for miles into the distance until we can't even see their curves anymore. They're lined with palm trees, and there's white sand everywhere, giving off the vibe of a middle-eastern beach resort. This is nice. I mean, it's so vast, so big. It's just like miles and miles of road. Up ahead, we can see a group of tall, shiny buildings. I think this is a residential part. I see about 1, 2, 3, 4, 5
buildings that are complete. Gray color, huge. This must be like the center, center of attraction. But other than construction workers, we see almost no people. It almost feels like we're on a set for a movie, but most of the cast hasn't shown up yet. In the distance, I think I can see the ocean, but it's too far away to say for sure. Driving around Eko Atlantic City, it's hard to believe that Makoko is just 15 kilometers away. The contrast between these
two communities couldn't be more stark. Makoko is crowded, busy and lively, and Eko Atlantic, it feels empty and ghostly quiet. In Makoko, there's no escaping the messy parts of life. Every day, people are confronted with their own garbage and their waste. Here in Eko Atlantic, the streets are immaculate. In Makoko, people struggle to come up with the $2,000 needed to build a humble home on the water. Here, people buy apartments with stunning ocean views for around a million
dollars. Only about 1000 people live here in Eko Atlantic City right now, but when it's done, this place could house up to 300,000 people. But although these two places feel very different, they are both potential solutions to the same problems, too much water and not enough land, and as the world heats up, both problems are getting worse. I could only see so much without stepping out of my car, so I decided that I
needed to come back with a guide. A few days later, I met up with David Adeleke, the communications manager for Eko Atlantic City at the time we reported this story. We met in a huge meeting room with gleaming floors and a tiny model of Lagos on display. On the walls were different stages of Eko Atlantic as the city formed.
We are in the Eko Atlantic sales office, and this particular place is the showroom. So you can see to my left the scaled down version of the of the project.
David told me that while the storms in the 2000s directly led to the construction of Eko Atlantic, to really understand the story of this place, we need to start much, much earlier.
This project started in 2008 but the process that led to the project started long before, started in the early 1900s.
He tells me that the flooding in Lagos isn't caused only by climate change, but also by another deadly force, colonization. He says the British dredged the Lagos harbor more than 100 years ago in. So bigger ships could come into shore, but when they did that, they changed the natural flow of the water and the way that it moved the sand. One of Lagos, most important beaches, Bar Beach, began to disappear, and then the shoreline began to recede.
By the 1950s. I think about half of the beach was already gone, but people didn't really notice, because nobody is standing there over 100 years with naked eyes monitoring the regression of the coastline.
The waters of the Atlantic Ocean were moving closer and closer to the heart of the city, and the situation became really critical in the early 2000s. Back then, violent storms flooded city streets in Lagos, fish poured onto the roads. Expensive office buildings, formerly considered prime real estate were abandoned. Some of them are still standing, marked by water lines. The solution that the Chagoury Group came up with was to build a huge sea wall and
then fill in the space behind it with rocks and sand. They've essentially created a barrier island, except it's a peninsula. They call it the Great Wall of Lagos. It's made from 1000s of concrete blocks that weigh five tons each. Davis says the part of the wall that's above sea level is about eight and a half meters, or around 28 feet.
But below sea level, we have at least 10 meters, and the wall at its base is over 50 meters wide. The wall is what protects Eko Atlantic and Victoria Island from the, from the ocean.
The Great Wall is about six kilometers long and still growing. David takes me on a tour around the city in a flashy black jeep. We get out by the Great Wall and stroll along the elevated sidewalk. Below us, I can see the blocks that make up the wall piled on top of each other. The waves are pummeling the wall, and it appears to be doing its job so far. When it
floods on the rest of Lagos, Eko Atlantic City stays dry. There are underground drainage systems here that carry the water out when it rains, and ocean waves haven't cleared the wall, at least not yet.
All of this is done mathematically. It's very technical. They put in all the data that they need to, put in the factor in the weather, and then they simulate ocean surges waves. The structure of the wall was still standing. So that's how we knew that this is able to withstand the worst possible storm in 1000 years.
So just to recap, this wall that is surrounding Victoria Island and Eko Atlantic. It mimics the original coastline, yes, and it's unbreakable.
Yes, this one is undestroyable.
I'm troubled by David's certainty, especially in a world that's heating up as quickly as ours. We're seeing so called "100-year floods" happen every decade now, and there's just no telling how things could play out when more extreme weather conditions set in. Still, for some people, Eko Atlantic City holds a lot of hope. David says, architects from neighboring countries like Ghana and Senegal are coming here for tips on how to respond to sea level rise in their own countries.
Because it's not just a Nigerian issue. It's an issue that West African nations are how do we put a stop to coastal erosion? Because people live in these places, right? So we need to find sustainable solutions for them.
But even if the sea wall holds there's a deeper question of who it's protecting, who this whole community is designed for. Eko Atlantic has its own power grid, its own sanitation system, its own housing, malls, schools and an Olympic sized swimming pool. It's a privately owned and privately operated community. Meanwhile, in the rest of Lagos, two out of three people living in informal communities like
Makoko. Eko Atlantic is coming to life in a place where many people don't have access to piped water, where hundreds of thousands of people are constantly at risk that the government will put them out of their homes, but Eko Atlantic is fully endorsed by the Lagos government. As David and I drive around, I see just one family that appears to actually live here. They're white. The only people who can afford Aqua Atlantic City are Nigeria's wealthiest 1% and foreigners
with big pockets. Talking to David, I get the sense that something else is at play for him and the developers behind Eko Atlantic City, something beyond stopping coastal erosion and creating opportunities.
Nigeria needs a project like this. Nigeria is the most populous black nation in the world. There is a symbol, there is a there is a mindset that people attach to Nigeria. And Nigeria needs something like this to bolster its image. And it's not just for public relations sake, but for like, for actual confidence, for something Nigerians need to be able to boast of. And this is what this project provides to Nigeria and Nigerians all over the world.
So for David, Eko Atlantic City represents more than just a luxury sea wall. I think he truly believes that the city gives Nigeria, gives Lagos attention on the world stage, that it commands respect, that it could boost tourism and that it can become a historic monument someday, a monument like the Empire State Building or Lady Liberty. This is more than just a climate solution. It's an image and a story about what Lagos is and what it will be in the future.
Shola, thank you so much for this reporting. It's been a really interesting journey. I want to just talk with you a little bit more about these two places, and I'm curious, as a Nigerian yourself, what do you think about what David just said about the importance of Eko Atlantic in terms of kind of like the image of Nigeria?
Well, I think it's interesting, and I do see David's viewpoint. But having said that, I don't necessarily feel the same way as David. Like I said, I understand the viewpoint, but I just don't think that that level of luxury is what I need to feel a certain kind of pride in my nation. I feel pride in my nation just as it is. I don't really need Eko Atlantic City to feel different. Personally, it doesn't add anything to me.
But it sounds like Eko Atlantic actually has quite a bit of support from the Lagos government. What about Makoko? Do people there have any kind of representation in the political system?
I asked this as well because I was just, you know, really surprised with the way that the Lagos state government has responded to them prior to this time, and Baale Alashe told me that they don't actually have anyone in parliament or any high ranking official in the state government, so that actually leaves them quite, you know,
vulnerable. But what they do have, you know, are people that are standing up for them regardless, after that terrible incident in 2012 where a man died when the authorities descended on Makoko to clear it out, we've seen a number of activists stand up for the community, and one of them is Nnimmo Bassey. He's quite a popular environmental activist here in Nigeria, and recently I caught up with him in Makoko.
Nnimmo is very, I would say, anti Eko Atlantic City, very anti the Lagos state government stance on Makoko, and he told me in very strong terms why he feels that way.
Eko Atlantic is like the devil's finger poking fun at the citizens of Lagos and Nigeria and Africa and the world. Eko Atlantic was a bad idea from the beginning.
Wow, the devil's finger, that is quite the indictment of Eko Atlantic City. But I have to say, personally, I kind of see where he's coming from. It's it's just hard for me to understand how creating this luxury community makes any sense when there are so many people in Lagos needing homes and basic services.
Yeah. I mean, you're right, and Nnimmo actually had thoughts about that too. I asked him about it.
Investment must also include human investment. Making Lagos, climate proof, climate change proof. This should be the area of investment. Otherwise, no matter what you put it today, it's just a waste of resources.
So Shola, why do you think the Lagos government said yes to Eko Atlantic City?
Well, the new land that equal Atlantic is built on, is helping to protect the main Lagos business district. This is where Lagos is making the most of its revenue from, and it didn't even cost the government anything. They got a very strong seawall for free, and now they have this new place that they can show off to people. It's a win win for them.
Yeah, I can see that, but it also looks like a pretty strong step toward a future where climate change just further, kind of divides us into the haves and the have nots. I want to wrap up here by just talking about this overlay of immigration in your story. Baale Alaashe said that a lot of people in Makoko moved there from Benin Republic. Is that right?
Yeah, um, Benin Republic is just actually beside Nigeria. And you have to remember that when the people moved here, they weren't moving to Nigeria. They were just moving. This was a time when the colonialists hadn't come to, to carve out Nigeria as a nation state, and that is interesting, because, you know, the Lagos state government likes to
describe the residents of Makoko as foreigners. I think it's a nice way to push the responsibility away from the state and say, well, this isn't our problem, because these people aren't true Lagosians, but because they come from families that have lived there for centuries, they are Lagosians. And they really, to me, embody the spirit of Lagos you know, the spirit of resilience and making something out of nothing, despite all the issues that they faced, all the
problems, they found a way. And that's something I think should be celebrated. Sure, I mean, some people there, they speak their own languages. They might not understand English properly. Right, it's a different Lagos, yes, but it's not a lesser Lagos. It's just a different, very interesting Lagos. Makoko adds to the flavor of Lagos. It. It adds to the uniqueness of
Lagos. It doesn't take away from it. So I think that Lagos state government definitely needs to rethink their stance on Makoko, and they already are.
Yeah, and I guess if people in Makoko can be kind of disregarded because they're supposedly foreigners, then it definitely opens the question of, what about all the non Nigerians who are going to be buying apartments in Eko Atlantic City?
Exactly. I think when, when it comes down to it, it's all about that paper money. If you have it, then you have some kind of legitimacy, even if you're not from Lagos. But if you don't, then you're vulnerable and you could be kicked out.
Well, Shola, thank you again for bringing us these really important stories. It's been such a pleasure working with you, and I am so glad that you were able to join us in Glasgow for the UN Climate Conference.
It was all my pleasure. I joined you in Glasgow for my first COp as well. So thank you.
And we'll be hearing more from Shola in just a bit when we arrive in Glasgow. So stay tuned.
Hello, I'm Eloysius calling from Brooklyn. Reporting for this season of Threshold was funded by the Park Foundation, the High Stakes Foundation, the Pleiades Foundation, NewsMatch, the Llewellyn Foundation, Montana Public Radio and listeners. This work depends on people who believe in it and choose to support it, people like you. Join our community at Thresholdpodcast.org.
This episode of Threshold was reported by me Shola Lawal, with help from Amy Martin, Erika Janik, and Nick Mott. The music is by Todd Sickafoose. The rest of the Threshold team is Caysi Simpson, Deneen Weiske, Eva Kalea and Sam Moore. Our intern is Emery Veilleux. Thanks to Sarah Sneath, Sally Deng, Maggy Contrares, Hana Carey, Dan Carreno, Luca Borghese, Julia Barry, Kara Cromwell, Katie
deFusco, Caroline Kurtz and Gabi Piamonte. Special thanks to Dennis Houkani George Denkey, Kidan Araya and Hassan Yahya. And special, special, thanks to you, my listener, for traveling with me all the way to Lagos, Nigeria. Till next time.