Does anyone remember this? My brother found this commemorative ashtray amongst my parents’ belongings.
Nigeria woke up one morning in 1972 and made the switch to drive RIGHT. Miraculously, it was mostly uneventful!
Nigeria, a former British colony, had traditionally been driving on the LEFT with British imported right-hand-drive cars but it decided to shake off its colonial past by shifting to the RIGHT. I guess this move was probably delayed by the civil war.
About a quarter of the world drives on the LEFT, 74 (vs 167 RIGHT drivers, and the countries that drive LEFT are mostly old British colonies). There is a perfectly good reason for this strange quirk of LEFT driving.
In the past, almost everybody travelled on the LEFT side of the road because that was the most sensible option for feudal, violent societies. Since most people are right-handed, swordsmen preferred to keep to the left in order to have their right arm nearer to an opponent and the sword further from them. And it also reduced the chance of the sword (worn on the left) hitting other people.
Also, a right-handed person finds it easier to mount a horse from the left side of the horse, away from traffic.
However, in the the late 1700s teamsters in France and the United States began hauling farm products in big wagons pulled by several pairs of horses. They sat on the left rear horse, so naturally wanted everybody to pass on the left so they could look down and make sure they kept clear of the oncoming wagon’s wheels. Therefore they kept to the RIGHT side of the road.
In addition, during the French Revolution of 1789, the aristocracy who usually travelled on the left of the road, forcing the peasantry over to the right, now preferred to keep a low profile and joined the peasants on the RIGHT.
Later Napoleon’s conquests spread the new RIGHTISM to Belgium,e Netherlands, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Germany, Poland, Russia and many parts of Spain and Italy. Voila! Only the countries that resisted Napoleon in Europe kept on the LEFT.
Most recently in 2009 Samoa (population 189,000) became the 3rd country ever to CHANGE FROM RIGHT TO LEFT driving.