According to Mr Odewuyi, a sanitation worker, most people would rather hand him a 500 naira note in pity than dispose their refuse appropriately. In August 2015, the newly-appointed Managing Director of the Lagos State Waste Management Agency, Engineer Abdul-Wahab Ogunbiyi spoke to the press and the general public. Among other interesting revelations, he said that, between taking wrappers off sweets and unpacking electronics from their cartons, the state was generating 13,000 metric tonnes of waste every month. The gory side effect of that statistic is that a fair amount of the waste that Lagosians generate ends up, not in polythene bags or bins, but on the curb, in gutters, on street corners from Ojuelegba to Ajah. Walk around Lagos, from the slums of Mushin to the high-rises and beach houses of Ikoyi, and there’s always a pile of refuse waiting to accost your eyes without permission. Lagosians are deemed to dispose of refuse on a whim, and the inner parts of the city are building a reputation for bad hygiene.
