This week’s subject of Navigating Nigeria is Anthony*, a media practitioner who spoke to Citizen about the frustrating process of getting roadworthiness papers in Lagos and why he thinks there’s still work to be done.
What was the process of getting your papers like?
I don’t really recall if this was in 2021 or 2022, but the Lagos State government announced that anyone who wanted to update their roadworthiness papers had to undergo testing for their vehicles.
Before then, the law required you to take your car to a Vehicle Inspection Service (VIS) centre for a test. But Nigerians abused the process and paid for it without actually having the vehicles tested. The officials would turn a blind eye, you collect your certificate and go about your day.
But things changed and it became so difficult to beat the system. You’d have to actually take the test and pray you pass. If you fail, you’d need to fix the issue and take back your vehicle for inspection before you get the certificate.
So this is how the whole thing works. When you initially go and pay, they’ll give you a receipt, along with a date for testing. On the given day, you go with the receipt to any of the centres in Lagos, based on the proximity to where you reside. Mine was around Ojo.
If you go on a day that isn’t scheduled for you, you’ll be delayed because they’d have to first answer the guys on the schedule before they get to you. I had visited earlier but the VIS centre had issues with the machines so I had to return another time.
What was it like when you visited again?
It was a very frustrating experience because the guy who attended to me had internet issues. At some point, he had to use his own hotspot to connect to the internet. When the internet started working, the system developed its own issues. They’re all connected to the cloud which also experienced a downtime. I spent around two hours just to make sure they entered my details correctly into the system.
We were given numbers and you’d wait your turn to get your details uploaded. After that, you’d go out and join a queue — I spent close to four hours there. I was just praying for something unexpected not to happen, like rainfall or the machines just packing up.
Any Nigerian who’s queued under hot sun knows the pain of waiting your turn and then finding out you cannot be attended to due to unforeseen circumstances. Their operating hours are between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. after which they’ll restrict the people coming to get their vehicles tested. Having to return to that scene again is a nightmare. Luckily, none of that happened to me.
Were there any positives?
Eventually, my turn came and the process really impressed me. It’s not a human doing the inspection and the machine does very thorough checks on the vehicle. You drive your car through and it performs a very detailed scan of everything — the brakes, engines and so on.
What’s your assessment of the process?
I still think the process can be better optimised, starting with the unnecessary waiting time to upload your details to the computer. Also, the downtime can be reduced with better internet infrastructure. Even though the process was supposed to be by the book, the guys there still asked me to, “Show them love”. It wasn’t forced though. Remove those and maybe the process would be less complicated.
Is that all?
I understand these inspections are important, but the process needs to be improved. For example, look at those danfos we see daily on Lagos roads, are they also being inspected? There’s hypocrisy there if you really look at it.
*Name changed to protect subject’s identity
