The religious noise of Lagos

I’m really looking forward to the day Lagos State Government will summon the political will to begin to implement its law on noise pollution. That would surely be the day sanity will return to Lagos.

It will be interesting to see a Pastor or Mallam actually arrested, prosecuted and convicted for noise pollution.

This 2-bed-room flat “church” in my neighbourhood has not let me sleep since 10.00pm when it commenced its night service (vigil). As I write, it is 3.19am and I have not had an hour of sleep because of the noise emanating from this “church” adjacent to my apartment.

There are not more than 10 worshippers in that sitting room, but they are using a microphone and four giant loudspeakers strategically positioned at the four corners of the sitting room. The noise is out of this world. There is no hope of even an hour’s sleep.

At the other end of this my 5-pole-street is also a Mosque, also doing its own night service, for some reason. The “Mosque” is also not more than a 3-bedroom apartment. Both Church and Mosque appear to be in contest for the more noisome.

I don’t know why some pastors and imams must shout at the top of their voice when they are preaching, even when they are using megaphone and giant loudspeakers in a small apartment not qualified for a place of worship.

It is even more baffling that a Government would enact a law it does not intend to implement. There is a subsisting law against noise pollution in Lagos State but the government does not appear to be interested in implementing it. Why enact it then?

The Law establishing LASEPA, that is, Lagos State Environmental Protection Agency Law Section 9 empowers the Agency to make regulations on acceptable standards or criteria to control the pollution level of water, air, noise and land in consonance with the Federal Government guidelines and policies and criteria on the environment. Among other things, the law is supposed to regulate noise from car horns, churches, mosques, club houses, hotels, beer parlours, event centres etc.

According to the law, nobody is allowed to make noise above 55 decibel during the day in the residential area and only 45 decibel is allowed in such area at night. In the industrial areas, 90 decibel of noise is allowed during the day while the noise rate must not exceed 80 decibel at night in such areas.”

But the law has never been implemented. There was some kind of initial gra-gra by officials of the Agency when the law was enacted. Some churches, hotels and club houses were sealed, but that is all, nothing else. The sealed properties were soon reopened. It is not difficult to deduce that religious bodies were behind the reason the law is now dead without being formally repealed.

There should be no sentiment about these things. Religious bodies, especially the Pentecostal variant of them, are beginning to do more harm than good. They put you in some kind of mental and emotional torture when they see only enemies and hatred around you – why they never see love and peace, I don’t know. They blackmail you psychologically, take money from you, sit you down for hours in service and after service meetings, put you in traffic hold-up for more hours, deprive your children admission into their school which you helped to build with your hard-earned money and also deprive you of much-needed sleep.

Any wonder depression and mental illness is on the rise?