September 11, 2025
The Lagos Environmental Sanitation Corps (LAGESC), popularly known as KAI, recorded a joint seizure of N2.5M worth of Styrofoam food packs and SUPs during enforcement operations spanning some Lagos markets and shopping malls in the past week.
In a statement released on Tuesday by the Agency, the Corps Marshal, Major Olaniyi Olatunbosun said the ban on Styrofoam is already in effect and has also been extended to single-use plastics.
“We discovered via intelligence reports that there are traders in shopping malls and markets around the State who keep flouting the orders of the State, hence our decision to undertake enforcement operations in the Agege, Oshodi, Idunmota, Mushin, Victoria Island and Lekki market areas, which resulted in a seizure of the banned products worth N2.5 million”.
Highlighting the harm caused by single-use plastics, Cole revealed how the Environment Ministry’s decision to announce the ban on July 1 remains in the best interest of the environment.
He also explained how plastic waste constitutes a negative threat to the coastal environment and the dangers it poses to public health in Lagos.
The retired Major stated that other items banned in the single-use category are plastic straws, plastic cutlery and all single-use carrier bags, nylons that have less than 40 micron thickness, putting to rest the misinformation currently peddled by mischief makers about the ban.
The Corps Marshal, therefore, read the riot act to traders to desist from trading in Styrofoam, SUPs, displaying wares for sale on road setbacks, lay-bys, medians, verges and gutter slabs, stressing that these activities are illegal under the State’s environmental laws.
Underscoring the need for pedestrians’ safety while crossing highways, the KAI top man advocated for the appropriate use of pedestrian bridges, just as he warned Lagosians to refrain from engaging in open urination, defecation and indiscriminate dumping of refuse, which blocks the drains and prevents the flow of storm water into the canals.
