LAGESC Intensifies Clampdown on Street Trading , Hawkers

The Lagos Environmental Sanitation Corps (LAGESC) has disclosed plans to step up its operations and ensuring total clampdown on the arrest of recalcitrant traders not yielding to the various warnings and advocacy on street trading and hawking in different parts of the state.

Adebayo Kehinde ,Head Public Affairs Unit , LAGESC, disclosed this on Thursday in a statement .

The statement quoted the Corps Marshal of the Agency, CP Akinpelu Gbemisola (retd) , saying :‘’the Governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu has directed that all the roads in the State be rid of any form of impediment for free flow of traffic as well as safety of all and sundry’’.

In her words, ‘’walkways are meant for pedestrians to walk and not for trading activities so as to give room for motorists to enjoy smooth vehicular movement’’.

The Corps Marshal further noted the rising numbers of hawkers on our major highways which pose grave security implications for motorists as criminals disguised as hawkers exploiting the opportunity to dispossess them of their valuables.

She explained that directives have been given to LAGESC officers to move out on all the major highways to arrest these hawkers for appropriate prosecution, saying that our roads are not meant for trading, but rather people should go into State-approved markets to engage in legalised trading activities.

She recounted that many lives have been lost due to brake failure as ‘hit and run’ drivers sometimes knock down hawkers, while some roads are always locked down as a result of activities of traders who display their goods on walkways and road sides for sale thereby impeding free vehicular and human movements on our roads.

Also commenting on the ongoing Ikoyi/Victoria Island Clean-up exercise which has recorded remarkable success with the joint effort of other agencies such as Environmental and Special Offences Unit (Taskforce), Lagos State Traffic Management Authority (LASTMA), Lagos Waste Management Authority (LAWMA), Lagos State Special Offences (Mobile) Courts and the Lagos Neighbourhood Safety Corps (LNSC).

She however expressed the readiness of LAGESC operatives in sustaining the cleared areas in Ikoyi and Victoria Island, while also warning that anybody found around these cleared areas will be prosecuted and their seized goods be forfeited.

She finally explained that the Commissioner for Environment and Water Resources, Mr. Tunji Bello has also directed that any of the Agency’s operatives found in any act compromising on this directive and the Clean-Up Exercise be dealt with accordingly.