Saving the Lagos environment

IN a bid to create an environmentally safe state, the Lagos State government recently enacted an Environmental Management and Protection Law. By the instrumentality of that law, it transformed the Kick Against Indiscipline (KAI) outfit to Environmental Sanitation Corps, marking all illegal structures on sewage systems for demolition. The law also mandates drivers of commercial vehicles to place litter bins in their vehicles, while outlawing street trading on major roads. According to the provisions of the law, if a driver fails to provide the litter bin, he or she will also be penalised alongside the passenger or the occupier of the vehicle who commits the offence of throwing litter onto the road. Further,  “it is an offence to engage in street trading along the major highways and streets of Lagos and sell in an unapproved market in Lagos while every owner, tenant and occupier of any shop, kiosks, space or stall in any market within the state shall on a regular basis ensure the cleanliness of his space.”

The new agency is expected to spearhead the enforcement of the penalties that will be imposed on violators of the new law. It is tasked with monitoring and maintaining surveillance along the highways, streets and public drainages, canals, markets and parks and has the responsibility of ensuring that citizens fulfill their civic duties by paying the Public Utilities Levy, a property-based charge payable by property occupants for the management of solid and liquid waste, wastewater and environmental intervention. The law prohibits the dumping of any toxic waste capable of causing harm in the state and all emissions from vehicles, plants and equipment including generating plants in residential, commercial and industrial areas within the state must mandatorily meet air emission standards. No manufacturing of chemicals, lubricants, petroleum products, gases, quarry, cement (except for those used in construction) will take place in a residential area.

Again, every owner or occupier of a facility who uses, stores, keeps and maintains underground storage tanks and surface storage tanks shall register such tanks with the enforcing authority while a facility monitoring and inspection exercise shall be carried out on all sites with surface or underground tanks periodically to determine the integrity of the facility involved. In addition, the soil test of the immediate environment shall be carried out as required. Defaulters will face stiff penalties, including heavy fines ranging from N250,000 to N5 million and/or imprisonment.

According to Governor Akinwunmi Ambode, the motivation of the new bill is  to save lives. He said:  “With the newly positioned LASECORPS, we will work within the community to enforce the new laws. The state will have a zero-tolerance policy for offenders because simply put, disregarding payment of your Public Utility Levy or flouting the new regulations ultimately promotes activities that lead to the loss of lives. The levy which is to replace all service fees previously paid to the waste management authorities is an annual charge that will take effect as the rollout commences.  We have worked closely with the public in determining the rates and have succeeded in keeping this levy relatively low.”

No doubt, the state government’s move to achieve a safe and secure environment is in order because it will save lives. The place of Lagos as the entry point to the country and its commercial nerve centre dictate no less. It is also important to take cognizance of its huge population and the massive inflow and outflow of people across the country witnessed in the state on a daily basis. We are particularly heartened by Governor Ambode’s statement that members of the public were consulted with before the new law was enacted. This is, we believe, the way to go because no law can succeed without the consent and commitment of the general public. It is equally true that laws are most effective when those who are to be affected by them have a full grasp of their intendment and are prepared to cooperate with the  government to achieve its objectives, provided that the government has demonstrated a commitment to fulfilling its own part of the bargain.

We however counsel the state government to pursue aggressive enlightenment campaigns, without which its objectives cannot be realised. If this is not done, the law designed to save lives will be viewed as a repressive state apparatus, and  resisted  with  false narratives and innuendoes. In the same vein, we do not endorse the proposition that LASECORPS’ performance evaluations and remuneration will be tied directly to the number of actionable fines that they issue for non-compliance, as this may encourage members of the corps to harass innocent members of the public in a bid to meet their revenue targets, thus defeating the objective of making Lagos environmentally sane and safe.