Adedayo Adejobi
Every year, millions of Nigerians are forced through the grind of roadworthiness certification in the name of safety. Yet the same government that polices their cars leaves highways cratered, flooded, and deadly. The irony is glaring: motorists must prove their vehicles are fit for the road, but the roads themselves remain unfit for vehicles. Adedayo Adejobi writes
On a humid Tuesday morning in Lagos, Sunday Okon, a 42-year-old banker, set out early to the Vehicle Inspection Office (VIO) in Ojodu berger. His plan was simple: renew his roadworthiness certificate. But what should have been a quick administrative stopover stretched into a two-day ordeal. There were endless queues, contradictory instructions, and a payment slip that mysteriously grew by N2,000 after “processing charges.”
By the time he left, humiliated and exhausted, his frustration boiled over.
“They treat you as though you are guilty for owning a car,” he sighed, clutching his papers.
Sunday’s story is far from unique. Across Nigeria, motorists are wasting hours—sometimes days—at the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) or VIO offices in pursuit of roadworthiness certification. The scheme, billed as a safety measure, has become instead a crucible of lost productivity, arbitrary charges, and the constant shadow of extortion.
The scale of this inefficiency is staggering. Nigeria, according to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has over 15 million registered vehicles, nearly half of them private cars. If even a fraction of their owners spend a day at inspection offices, the cumulative loss in manhours is vast.
What is sold as a safety net often feels more like a trap, a system where enforcement is less about keeping vehicles fit for the road and more about squeezing citizens who already live under heavy economic strain.
Meanwhile, the irony glares from every pothole and flooded underpass: while government officials zealously demand that motorists prove their cars are “roadworthy,” whilst the roads themselves remain anything but car worthy. From cratered highways in the southwest, east, and North-Central, to the flooded arterials of Lagos, drivers spend fortunes repairing damage caused not by negligence but by the very infrastructure they are forced to use.
At VIO offices in Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt and Kano, long queues are now routine. Motorists arrive before dawn to beat the backlog, only to be kept waiting for hours. Those who complain are told to “cooperate”—a euphemism for greasing palms to get faster service. For workers like Sunday, that means wasted workdays. For self-employed Nigerians, it means lost income.
The financial burden cuts just as deep. Officially, renewing a certificate costs between N5,000 and N10,000 for private vehicles, N12,000 to N25,000 for commercial buses, and up to N35,000 for heavy-duty trucks.
Add in “processing charges” and bribes, and the figure climbs further. For a family with two cars in Lagos, the annual outlay could easily exceed N15,000—a painful bite in an economy where minimum wage is N70,000.
Sadiq Agbede, an automobile mechanic in Ibadan, told the reporter that many of his clients now weigh school fees or groceries against paying for “this paper.” “People are asking: should I feed my children or renew my certificate?” he said.
What rubs salt in the wound is the double standard. While private motorists are hounded, commercial drivers—especially Lagos’s notorious danfo operators—appear to enjoy immunity.
Their yellow buses weave recklessly through traffic, often with bald tyres and cracked windscreens. They overload passengers, drive against traffic, and flout basic rules of courtesy and safety. Yet a quick handshake to an officer is usually enough to clear them.
“It’s as though owning a private car is a sin in Nigeria,” said Bolaji Bada, a civil servant in Lagos, “The danfos get away with murder every day, while we are the ones punished.”
On a weekday morning in Oshodi, the hypocrisy is on full display. Danfo buses mount sidewalks, bully their way across junctions, and ignore traffic lights. Police and VIO officers wave them on after pleasantries and sometimes a discreet bribe exchange. Meanwhile, a private Corolla owner who pulled over for a “routine inspection” is fined and delayed. Enforcement, in this picture, looks less like safety and more like selective persecution.
And when danfos crash, the consequences are often fatal. At Bolade, Oshodi intersection in January 2025, a danfo driver ran a red light and rammed into a commercial motorcycle. One passenger died instantly; the rider was dragged under the bus and survived with severe injuries. Four months later, in May 2025, another danfo, reportedly driven by an intoxicated driver, lost control in Abule Egba and smashed into an oncoming vehicle, injuring several passengers, including a couple seated in the middle row.
Earlier, at Orile, ASCON Bus Stop, a collision between a container truck and a danfo left the conductor, Saheed, dead at the scene, while an okada rider caught in the crash was seriously injured.
These are not freak accidents—they are routine headlines. Lagos’s Vehicle Inspection Service in May 2025, recently revealed it had impounded more than 200 rickety danfos and minibuses in one sweep, vehicles that officials themselves admitted were unsafe for public roads on account of faulty components such as expired tires, malfunctioning brakes, and rusted frames.
Lagos may seem like an outlier, but the story is national. The National Bureau of Statistics reported a 24 percent jump in road accidents in the last quarter of 2023, with commercial vehicles most frequently involved. Across the country that year, more than 10,600 crashes left over 70,000 people injured or dead. Two-thirds of the vehicles involved were commercial buses, minibuses, or haulage trucks.
The Federal Road Safety Corps has noted repeatedly that in such crashes, passengers bear the heaviest burden, a stark reminder that recklessness in commercial driving disproportionately harms ordinary Nigerians. States like Ogun, Kaduna, and the FCT routinely record some of the highest crash numbers, showing that the problem is widespread.
Against this backdrop, the government’s obsession with hounding private car owners rings hollow. If roadworthiness inspections were truly about safety, danfos and other forms of commercial transportation would be first in line, not last.
The contradiction begs a larger question: can a government that neglects its highways credibly police the roadworthiness of vehicles?
A 2023 report by the Nigerian Society of Engineers estimated that over 70 percent of federal roads are in poor condition. The World Bank has warned that Nigeria loses more than $3 billion annually in productivity and repairs due to bad roads.
Tyre blowouts, axle failures, and suspension damage caused by potholes account for a significant share of crashes. “No amount of inspection can offset the damage caused by our roads,” said transport analyst Olalere Ajose.
“If the government really cared about safety, it would first certify its roads before questioning citizens’ cars.”
Stories from across the country reinforce the futility and indignity of the current system.
In Abuja, motorists queued for hours in the sun only to be informed the system was “offline.”
In Ondo, it has been documented how road safety officials openly demanded bribes before issuing certificates.
In Kano, reports abound that motorists whose cars were impounded had to “do the needful” before release.
Aminu Bello, a Kano hibiscus trader, recalled how his car was seized for two days. “They told me to pay N10,000,” he said.
“When I said I had no money, they kept my car. I had to borrow from my brother to get it back. They don’t care if you miss work or lose income.”
In Port Harcourt, Blessing, a young entrepreneur, spent six hours at a VIO office. When she finally reached the front, the officer told her that her brake lights were dim and she should “settle” to avoid delays. “It felt less like safety enforcement and more like organised extortion,” she said.
Across the country, the pattern repeats: inefficiency, corruption, humiliation. And in the end, Nigerians pay twice—once for certification, and again for the damage caused by the very roads they drive on.
There are saner alternatives. Many countries decentralise inspections, allowing certified private garages to handle testing under strict oversight. Nigeria could do the same, reducing queues at government offices and cutting down the opportunities for petty extortion.
Roadworthiness checks could also be integrated with insurance and licensing databases, sparing motorists from physical visits altogether.
“In South Africa, your car’s inspection status is tied to its insurance and licence renewal,” explained transport consultant Sola Adeniji. “It’s seamless and corruption-proof. Nigeria could do the same if the will existed.”
‘Validity periods could be staggered so that new cars, less prone to failure, get three-year certificates, while older cars require annual checks. And most importantly, revenues from roadworthiness fees should be transparently reinvested into fixing roads.’
As Lagos lawyer and motorist Laide Awolola put it, “People will pay if they can see the money fixing potholes that damage their cars. But right now, it feels like we are funding officials’ pockets, not safer roads.”
Until Nigeria takes those steps, roadworthiness certificates will remain what many motorists already know them to be: pieces of paper bought at a price, bearing little relation to actual safety.
The government’s fixation on policing motorists while ignoring crumbling infrastructure is a hypocrisy citizens can no longer ignore.
Back in Ojodu, after finally collecting his renewed certificate, Sunday’s frustration gave way to bitter humour. “My car is certified roadworthy,” he said. “But the real question is—are Nigerian roads themselves car-worthy?”
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