Helmet issues in Nigeria, We need to tell our representatives about juju and refuse to wear helmets!

OFF THE WIRE
By WILL CONNORS
NOVEMBER 19, 2010
Putting a Cap on Bad Juju Conjures Up a Good Business
Nigerians Turn to a Thin Cloth Hat to Dodge Helmet Head Games.....
Will Connors/The Wall Street Journal
Okada union rep Femi Prince Fasehun tries to get passengers to wear helmets, saying helmet juju is 'a lie.'
LAGOS, Nigeria—This megacity's motorcycle taxis are so dangerous that local hospitals have special orthopedic wards meant just for people who have suffered accidents while riding them. So you'd think a law requiring passengers to wear helmets would be well received.
But it turns out that, for many Nigerians, the only thing scarier than a motorcycle taxi is a motorcycle helmet. Many people refuse to wear them out of fear of juju, or supernatural powers. Some fret that previous passengers may have put nefarious juju spells on the helmets to steal someone's good fortune, or to make a person disappear in order to be used in a sacred ritual, say motorcycle taxi drivers and passengers.
"Our people are quite superstitious about anything dealing with their head," says Ralph Ibuzo, a 43-year-old architect whose closely cropped hair is beginning to gray. "People believe that if you put on a helmet, [others] can take away your brain, or your good luck."
So Mr. Ibuzo created the "Original Lapa Guard," a cloth cap that he claims can protect wearers from disease and sudden disappearance. The cloth provides a thin layer of separation between the head and a helmet full of potential trouble.
The biggest city in sub-Saharan Africa is a cosmopolitan place, home to millions of Christians and Muslims, renowned musicians and artists, and professionals commuting to work in designer clothes. But the fear of juju isn't new here, and product roll outs have been tricky. Indomie, now the market leader in instant noodles, was at first rumored to contain worms from Asia. When condom distribution drives picked up in the 1990s, talk was that men using them would vanish. And when mobile phones became popular, some said certain numbers meant a person was going to die.
Mr. Ibuzo has the law on his side, however. In early 2009, Lagos enacted a traffic regulation that requires passengers on Nigeria's motorcycle taxis, called okadas, to don helmets. Despite efforts at enforcement by city officials and traffic police, most passengers refuse to wear them out of concern about juju—or because of germs.
Aside from preventing unwelcome mingling with the supernatural, Mr. Ibuzo says he's concerned about improving safety, too. Last year, he witnessed an accident that killed a young man who wasn't wearing a helmet while riding on the back of an okada.
Roughly 2,500 people died in okada accidents in the first half of 2010, according to the Federal Road Safety Commission, though many believe the actual number is much higher.
To persuade people to wear protective headgear, Mr. Ibuzo created the hygienic cap but struggled to manufacture the product. Banks wouldn't lend to a small, unproven business; the cost of running the operation was high in Nigeria, where electric power is erratic and most companies depend on diesel-powered generators; and Chinese factories wouldn't make his caps in small quantities.
Eventually Mr. Ibuzo used his own money, and after a trip to Suzhou, China, found a factory with experience making surgical gowns and caps. The first shipment of one million Chinese-made caps arrived in May.
That's when Mr. Ibuzo confronted an unanticipated challenge. He had to convince customers that his caps could protect against—and not cause—juju. Mr. Ibuzo started a grassroots publicity campaign that included radio advertisements stressing the absence of juju in his cloth cap.
Juju is widely feared in Nigeria and throughout West Africa, but that isn't commonly acknowledged among city sophisticates.
"Some people blame juju [for bad things], others don't. But juju is real," insists Israel Alofohkai, an okada union secretary in the Onigbongbo area of Lagos, who has started selling Mr. Ibuzo's caps. "It's very rampant."
To reach as many customers as possible, Mr. Ibuzo is cooperating with the powerful okada unions of Lagos. Okada riders are natural partners for Mr. Ibuzo's company, because they ride into every small corner of the city and because they, too, have struggled to convince passengers that helmets are not juju objects.
"They said if you wear [helmets], some people do disappear or get a headache or they'll take your luck," said Femi Prince Fasehun, an okada union representative. "But it's a lie. It's a lie. If they don't wear them, the police will arrest us, and we'll be the ones who have to pay."
Thousands of passengers ride okadas every day through the chaotic streets of Lagos. Some passengers use their own handkerchiefs underneath the helmet. Others hold the helmets above their heads to pass muster with the traffic police. Still others refuse to wear helmets at all.
On a recent sweltering day, sales rep Mercy Obi picked up a box of caps and walked into the Ketu neighborhood of Lagos to make some sales. She says she tends to avoid extolling the caps' use against juju because she doesn't want to be responsible if something does happen.
"We don't tell them about rituals and juju because they might believe us and it might still not work," Ms. Obi said.
Prince Olukosi, a civil servant, bought two Original Lapa Guard packs from Ms. Obi for family members. "It's for hygiene, and safety," Mr. Olukosi said when asked why he had bought them.
Even juju skeptics are welcoming the head caps.
"Anything that will remove rumors, that will encourage people to be safe," says Kayode Opeifa, the special assistant on transportation to the Lagos State government, who has been charged with enforcing the helmet law. "For me it makes my job easier if there's something that can stand in between to those who believe [in juju]."
Either way, Mr. Ibuzo's start-up is gaining traction. Half of the first shipment has already been sold.
Though Mr. Ibuzo says concerns surrounding juju-laced helmets will fade over time as they have with other products in Nigeria, some of his sales people are striking while the issue is hot. At a party last week, Adewumi Momoh, a marketer working for Mr. Ibuzo, hired the emcee of the event to talk up the Original Lapa Guard. "He would say, 'Somebody disappeared yesterday. You want to disappear? You want craw craw [infection]?' People said, 'Nooo!' so he says, 'Come, buy this thing.' And they rushed to buy it."