Deadly shortcuts: The corruption ridden Nigeria’s vehicle inspections

•Vehicle Inspection Officers (VIO) on duty

Every morning on Nigeria’s highways, thousands of cars, buses, and trucks set off carry­ing families, traders, and goods. Many arrive safely; some do not. A central but often overlooked reason is that too many vehicles that should have been grounded continue to ply the roads.

Vehicle inspection – the sys­tematic examination of brakes, steering, lights, emissions, and structural soundness – remains one of the most effective tools for reducing mechanical failures and preventing avoidable crashes.

Yet, in Nigeria, the promise of modern, computerised inspec­tion has collided with patchy im­plementation, uneven standards, and, in many cases, outright corruption, reports Daily Independent.

The result is a system that sometimes ensures safety – and some­times merely produces a certificate.

A System Designed To Protect

The Vehicle Inspection Service (VIS) – operating at federal and state levels – was established to certify that vehicles meet min­imum road-worthiness standards before regis­tration or renewal.

The VIS issues a Road Worthiness Certificate valid for a period of one year from the date of issu­ance. At the expiration of this period, vehicle own­ers are required to renew the certificate annually to ensure that their vehicles remain compliant with safety and environmen­tal standards set by the authorities.

While some states may issue temporary certifi­cates valid for six months, particularly for newly registered vehicles, the standard validity period for both private and com­mercial vehicles remains twelve months.

By standard, renewal is subject to a mandatory in­spection process at desig­nated centres to confirm that each vehicle meets the necessary road safe­ty requirements before a new certificate is granted.

Over the past decade, there has been a drive to automate these checks. Computerised centres equipped with diagnostic tools such as brake testers, gas analysers, suspension rigs, and headlamp align­ers were introduced to eliminate subjectivity and human interference.

Dr. Yusuf Suberu, who coordinates road safety advocacy activities for the VIS Mayor, as an aux­iliary officer, has pub­licly urged motorists to use these computerised facilities. “Regular vehi­cle inspection will reduce road crashes,” he said at a recent transport forum, stressing that “many ve­hicles with mechanical defects ply the roads daily because of poor enforce­ment and lack of aware­ness.”

But while technology is spreading, malpractice remains entrenched.

How It’s Bypassed

In Lagos State, the cost of obtaining and renewing a road worthiness certif­icate varies depending on the vehicle category.

Reports indicate that for private vehicles that go through due process, the official renewal fee rang­es between N10,000 and N15,000, while commer­cial vehicles attract high­er charges, estimated be­tween N20,000 and N25,000.

However, investiga­tions by our correspondent reveal that the inspection process, in many centres has been undermined by what insiders call “paper road-worthiness” – certifi­cates issued at exorbitant rates without actual me­chanical tests.

In Lagos, two vehicle owners shared their ex­periences anonymously. One, a commercial driver operating between Ikotun and Oshodi, admitted that he obtains his road-wor­thiness certificate within a few hours without his vehicle ever entering the inspection bay.

“All I do is meet an agent outside the VIO centre,” he recounted.

“He usually tells me not to bother with inspection because it takes days. I al­ways pay about twice the official rate, and within hours, the paper is ready. I have been doing that for over seven years now, and my bus never even en­tered the compound.”

A second Lagos motor­ist, a private car owner based in Surulere, echoed a similar story.

“I always try to keep my car in good condition since I bought it. But be­cause having a road-wor­thiness certificate is mandatory to avoid ha­rassment, I usually renew it before it expires.

“I have someone at the VIO in Ike­ja that helps me to get the certificate because I don’t have time to go join the long queue for inspection. I don’t even know the offi­cial rate but I usually pay him a reasonable amount, and by the next day, my certificate is ready,” he said.

“I haven’t taken my car for any inspection. Just paperwork.”

In Abuja, where the Federal Capital Territory Directorate of Road Traf­fic Services (DRTS) oper­ates some of the country’s most modern facilities, one vehicle owner also confessed that the system is not immune.

“I know someone inside the DRTS who helps me process my papers,” said the owner, who drives a 2014 Toyota Corolla.

“The official charge might be less but sometimes I pay him N20,000, sometimes N25,000, and he gets the certificate within hours. They don’t even ask for an inspection report. If you want it fast, you pay more; that’s how it works.”

These voices reflect a widespread practice that undermines the very foundation of Nigeria’s road safety regime.

An Insider Speaks: The Abuse From Within

A serving VIS officer in Lagos, who spoke on condition of anonymity, confirmed to our correspondent that the process has been “deeply com­promised” – particularly at inspection centres at­tached to local govern­ment secretariats.

“The truth is that many vehicle owners don’t go through actual inspection anymore,” he revealed. “They prefer to ‘settle’ agents or offi­cers to get the certificate quickly. Top officers in the system know about it and have turned it into a money-making racket.”

He provided a vivid account of how the prac­tice operates at the VIS inspection centre located within the Ikotun Local Government Secretariat.

“At the Ikotun centre, for example, some of­ficers collaborate with touts who approach mo­torists at the gate,” he explained.

“They collect documents, process them internally, and print the certificate without any physical inspection. The money is shared – some to the junior staff, some to senior officers. A vehicle that should go through brake and suspension tests leaves with a clean bill of health on paper. It happens every day.”

The officer said simi­lar cases occur in other centres across the state, especially in overcrowded areas like Ojodu, Badagry, and Mushin.

“When the head office conducts random audits, officers quickly arrange for a few cars to be tested for show, just to pretend that procedures are fol­lowed,” he added. “But behind the scenes, most certificates are bought.”

The Numbers Tell Their Own Story

The Federal Road Safe­ty Corps (FRSC) recorded 5,081 road traffic deaths in 2023, a figure that rose to 5,421 in 2024, despite re­ported decreases in total crash numbers.

Accord­ing to FRSC data, over 20 percent of accidents in 2024 were linked to mechanical faults such as brake failure, burst tyres, and steering prob­lems – faults that standard inspection should have detected.

In the FCT, official data from the Directorate of Road Traffic Services show that 63,256 vehicles were registered, 66,954 re­validated, and 13,716 sub­jected to inspection in a six-month period. Yet, in­siders say a large number of these so-called “inspec­tions” never involved an actual mechanical test.

Across Lagos, official estimates suggest that about 2.1 million vehicles are registered, with rough­ly 400,000 undergoing “roadworthiness renewal” annually. But with only a handful of fully operation­al computerised centres – less than 10 in the entire state – experts question how many vehicles can realistically be inspected under existing capacity.

Why It Persists

Investigation reveals that systemic corruption, inadequate infrastruc­ture, and weak enforce­ment feed the cycle.

“The process is designed to be transparent,” said the anonymous VIS official, “but it’s been overtaken by human shortcuts.”

It was gath­ered that in Lagos, inspec­tion centres are run in partnership with private operators under the pub­lic-private partnership (PPP) model.

While the arrangement was meant to ensure efficiency, it has also created opportunities for rent-seeking. Some op­erators reportedly issue certificates based on record entries rather than physi­cal inspection, especially when pressure mounts to meet revenue targets.

The anonymous Lagos VIS officer confirmed this link:

“The PPP centres are supposed to remit revenue to the state government, so they are under pres­sure to process as many vehicles as possible. Some staff simply issue certifi­cates to meet targets – the fewer vehicles fail inspec­tion, the more revenue they record.”

Consequences On The Road

The implications are deadly. The FRSC attri­butes roughly one in five fatal crashes to vehicle de­fects that could have been detected and fixed during a proper inspection. In one widely reported in­cident in Ogun State in early 2025, a tanker with faulty brakes overturned on the Sagamu-Benin Expressway, killing six people and injuring nine others. The vehicle’s last inspection certificate had been issued only two weeks earlier.

The findings are alarm­ing – if computerised in­spections can be bypassed with cash, the system be­comes meaningless.

“You can’t rely on paper cer­tificates when lives are at stake,” said the anon­ymous VIS officer. “It means any car, no matter how dangerous, can be de­clared roadworthy.”

Calls For Transparency And Reform

Experts argue that fix­ing the inspection system requires more than ma­chines – it requires integ­rity, oversight, and digital accountability.

Civil society groups like the Safety Advo­cacy and Empower­ment Foundation (SAEF), a registered non-govern­mental, not-for-profit or­ganisation based in La­gos, have called for the digitisation of inspection records linked directly to the national vehicle regis­tration database, making it possible to verify the authenticity of any cer­tificate by plate number.

In practice, if each ve­hicle’s inspection result should be uploaded in real time to a national portal accessible to the FRSC, insurers, and the public, fake certificates will be­come harder to issue.

Also, linking inspec­tion data to insurance underwriting, would en­courage honesty. Insur­ers could refuse to cover vehicles without verifi­able inspection histories, creating an incentive for compliance.

A Matter Of Life And Policy

For many Nigerians, ve­hicle inspection remains a bureaucratic formality – another stamp to obtain, not a safety requirement. The VIO’s repeated calls for motorists to embrace computerised testing have been drowned by public distrust and cost concerns.

But the evidence is clear: inspection saves lives. As Dr. Suberu once remarked, “Every vehi­cle that passes inspection genuinely becomes less of a danger to its passengers and others on the road.”

Until that principle becomes reality across Nigeria, thousands of vehicles will continue to bear glossy certificates of road-worthiness – but re­main, in truth, potential death traps.