Lagos State Task Force said it is set to prosecute 15 illegal traders arrested early on Tuesday in Oyingbo area of the state, noting that the culprits if found guilty risk paying a fine of N90,000 each or six-month jail term as stipulated in the law.
Task Force Chairman, CSP Olayinka Egbeyemi, who led the enforcement team in collaboration with the Lagos State Environmental Sanitation Corps (LAGESC), made this known in a statement issued by the agency’s spokesperson, Mr. Adebayo Taofiq, saying the arrest and prosecution were in continuation of the clampdown on all illegal street-trading activities across the state.
According to Egbeyemi, the15 illegal traders were arrested during an enforcement operation that dislodged over 1,500 trespassers in Oyingbo, saying the affected traders had persisted despite several warnings.
He said the traders had continued to display and sell their wares on main roads, medians, road-setbacks, drainage alignments as well as railway tracks around the entire Oyingbo market area.
Egbeyemi said the action of the traders impeded the free flow of traffic along the axis, insisting that Lagos State government would not tolerate such illegal activities that violated the environmental laws of the state.
“The enforcement operation was also meant to protect lives of those illegal traders from unforeseen circumstances such as accident from reckless private/commercial drivers and also to decongest traffic gridlock along that axis,” he added.
He, therefore, warned those engaged in illegal street-trading to desist from endangering their lives and should operate inside the ‘Oyingbo Ultra-Modern Market’ built by the Lagos State government.
