Current Time in Alimosho, Nigeria

Alimosho occupies the north-western corner of Lagos State in south-western Nigeria, stretching from the edge of Ikeja out to the boundary with Ogun State. It is the largest local government area in Lagos by both territory and population, and it takes in a long list of well-known communities including Ikotun, Egbeda, Idimu, Igando, Ipaja, Ayobo, Akowonjo and Isheri Olofin. The land is flat and low-lying, crossed by small rivers and drainage channels, and almost entirely built over.

Population estimates vary widely, but Alimosho is generally reckoned to hold well over two million residents, which would make it larger than many African capitals and bigger than several Nigerian states. Its importance is fundamental to how Lagos functions: it is the great residential reservoir of the metropolis, providing affordable housing for the traders, artisans, drivers, teachers and office workers who keep the commercial capital of Nigeria running.

The area was originally farmland and forest belonging to Awori Yoruba communities, whose settlements grew yams, cassava and palm produce and traded with the lagoon towns. It remained rural into the 1960s. As Lagos expanded after independence and during the oil boom, land here was cheap and accessible, and estates began to appear, most notably the large government housing scheme at Abesan built in the early 1980s. Growth then became explosive and largely unplanned, and within a generation villages separated by farmland had merged into a continuous city. Alimosho was created as a local government area in 1981 and has been the subject of repeated proposals to split it because of its sheer size.

Alimosho has few formal tourist attractions, but it offers something arguably more interesting, which is the daily life of ordinary Lagos at full volume. Ikotun and Egbeda markets are enormous and sell everything imaginable, roadside workshops repair vehicles and electronics, and the streets are lined with churches, mosques, schools and small businesses. Weekend parties, with canopies erected across side streets, live bands and mountains of jollof rice, are a genuine spectacle, and the area has produced many figures in Nigerian music and comedy.

The population is predominantly Yoruba, but people from every Nigerian ethnic group live here, and English and Nigerian Pidgin serve as common languages alongside Yoruba. Religious life is intense and highly visible, with large Pentecostal congregations and prominent mosques, and football viewing centres, barbershops and food stalls form the social infrastructure of every neighbourhood.

Transport is the area's greatest difficulty, since the Lagos–Abeokuta Expressway and the roads through Ikotun and Ipaja carry immense traffic. Minibuses, motorcycle and tricycle taxis dominate, while investment in bus corridors and the new Lagos rail lines is gradually improving journeys into the centre. Numerous schools, colleges, private universities and general hospitals serve the population.

Alimosho is where the scale and ambition of Lagos are most apparent, a city within a city that is still growing every year.