Lagos Reintroduces Monthly Sanitation to Combat “Existential” Waste Crisis

​Lagos State is returning to its roots of communal cleanliness. In a move to reverse a decade of environmental neglect, the state government has officially announced the comeback of the mandatory monthly environmental sanitation exercise.

​Speaking Monday on TVC’s breakfast show, Your View, the Commissioner for the Environment and Water Resources, Mr. Tokunbo Wahab, framed the decision as a necessary response to an “existential” threat. With a population surging past 22 million, Wahab argued that the state can no longer afford the “despicable” conditions that have become commonplace in many neighborhoods.

​A New Schedule for a Cleaner City

​The exercise is set to officially kick off on Saturday, April 25, 2026. Residents will be expected to clean their immediate surroundings and street drainages between 6:30 am and 8:30 am.

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​”This translates to just two hours a month,” Wahab noted, emphasizing that the goal is to reinstate a culture of discipline that defined Lagos over a decade ago.

​Legal Hurdles Cleared

​The monthly exercise was famously suspended years ago following a legal challenge by a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, who questioned the legitimacy of the movement restrictions. However, Wahab confirmed that the State has since secured a favorable judgment at the Court of Appeal, affirming that the laws governing the enforcement of sanitation are both legitimate and necessary for public orer.

​Beyond the Broom: A Modern Strategy

​While the manual cleaning of gutters is a visible part of the plan, the Commissioner highlighted that the administration is tackling the waste crisis on multiple fronts:

• ​Infrastructure: Continued investment in sustainable drainage to mitigate perennial flooding.
• ​Policy: Maintaining the ban on Styrofoam and single-use plastics.
• ​Waste-to-Wealth: The state is decommissioning the aging Olusosun dumpsite and transitioning toward waste-to-energy initiatives. New landfills have already been established at Erekiti (Badagry) and Oke-Oso (Epe).

​A Call for Collective Responsibility

​The government is not acting alone. In the coming weeks, the Ministry will engage Local Government executives, Market Leaders, and the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) to ensure total compliance.

​”The environment is our common patrimony,” Wahab stated. “How we treat it is exactly how it will treat us.” He urged Lagosians to stop viewing waste as trash and start seeing it as a recyclable resource that can generate income.