Transporters moving food produce across Southwest Nigeria pay dozens of levies before reaching markets. BusinessDay Investigations traced the network of local authorities, unions, market leaders, revenue arrangements, and political influence behind the collections and how the extra costs are passed on to consumers through higher food prices. SODIQ OJUROUNGBE writes
For David Adekoya, a 50-year-old interstate truck driver, the journey from Iwo in Osun State to Ishaga in Lagos is not just a trip across four states. Along the route, a chain of collection points adds levies and charges that increase the cost of moving food produce before it reaches its destination.
At the market in Iwo, Adekoya said the journey starts with two tickets costing about N2,000. From there, another N2,000 is demanded at Odo-Oba, followed by N1,500 at Lalupon. At Toll Gate Arin, the charge rises to about N3,500 before another N1,300 is paid around Berger.
He noted that the owners of the goods would pay an additional N4,000, while other union-related payments and money demanded by other roadside actors, including police, can add to the bill.
By the time the vehicle gets to its destination, Adekoya estimated that between N12,000 and N15,000 would have gone into the different payments aside the cost of rising fuel prices.
The route tells its own story, with a payment attached to several stops along the way. For Adekoya, the numbers are not merely figures on a receipt; they determine what he must charge the people whose food he transports.
‘All these ticket payments are part of what we consider when we charge our customers. We cannot bear the cost ourselves because it will affect what we make from the trip. So, we add the cost of the tickets to the transportation charge and share it among the owners of the goods we are carrying,’ Adekoya told BusinessDay.
Beyond the number of tickets, Adekoya said there are occasions when he pays for the same ticket twice at different locations on the same journey.
‘The Northway tickets, costing N2,000, are mostly paid twice, especially when you pass through the Berger side to Mile 12 or any other part of Lagos. There are boys in Berger who will not allow you to go until you pay them, and that will not stop the collectors at the market from giving you the same tickets,’ he said.
Other drivers interviewed by BusinessDay Investigations described the same experience, saying payment at one collection point does not exempt them from another demand for the same ticket or charge.
In some cases, truckers noted that the amount demanded also differs from what is printed on the ticket.
Saheed Olanrewaju, a trucker who transports food items mostly between Ogbomoso and Lagos, told BusinessDay Investigations that there is usually a disparity between the printed price on tickets and the amount paid.
BusinessDay obtained one of the tickets marked N200; however, Olanrewaju and other traders interviewed insisted that the actual payment is N2,000.
These additional costs come at a time when food prices remain high. The National Bureau of Statistics revealed that food inflation stood at 20.31 percent year-on-year in July 2026, up from 17.52 percent recorded in the previous month.
More than 20 food transporters interviewed across Lagos and Ogun, including those moving produce from Iseyin, Ibarapa, Ogbomoso, Abeokuta, Osun, and Ondo to Mile 12, Shasha, Oyingbo, and Bodija, described a system in which charges accumulate as goods move between production areas, transport corridors, and markets. In some cases, transporters pay more than 500 percent of the amount printed on the ticket.
Transporters also said the various tickets include some from the NURTW, local government gate, and RTEAN, and they still have to pay before offloading the food produce.
The differences between ticket values and amounts demanded, alongside repeated payments for the same charge, increase transporters’ costs.
For transporters like Adekoya and Olanrewaju, the cost of the tickets is factored into the charges passed to food traders, who in turn incorporate their costs into selling prices.
A trader, Bose Alade, who brings her goods from Shaki in Oyo State to Mile 12 Lagos Market, said the cost incurred on logistics is competing with the actual cost of food items.
‘If you don’t pay all of them, they will not let you leave; they will threaten or delay you, and our goods are perishable; we cannot afford any delay,’ she said.
Nigeria’s tax framework assigns particular taxes and levies to different levels of government and limits collection to the appropriate tax authority.
In January 2024, Taiwo Oyedele, then chairman of the Presidential Committee on Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms, said truckers moving produce, including food, could face more than 50 stickers and pay over N450,000 on a single trip.
He linked the burden of taxes and transportation costs to differences between food prices in rural and urban areas.
BusinessDay Investigations, however, found that the problem is not limited to the number of stickers but is also about the overlap of collection claims and the interests that control them.
A 2025 study of road taxes on vegetable transportation found that road taxes accounted for an average of 15 percent of transportation costs on the routes studied, rising to 19 percent on Lagos routes, 14 percent on Benin routes, 13 percent on Ogun routes, and 12 percent on Oyo routes.
Inside the collection network
Investigation by this paper found that the collection points encountered by food transporters do not operate in isolation.
It was discovered that behind some of the tickets and charges are arrangements involving local politicians, transport unions, market leadership, and individuals who secure access to revenue-generating activities around markets and transport corridors.
A ticket collector around the Mile 12 axis who spoke to BusinessDay Investigations said he does not obtain tickets independently.
According to him, a youth leader known as Jafar facilitates the arrangement, obtains tickets through NURTW, and assigns collectors to designated points.
He added that collectors account for their proceeds through the same structure and retain an agreed share.
‘The youth leader is the one in charge, and he gets the ticket at a certain amount from the NURTW, and we are expected to sell it at an agreed price so that at the end of the day, we can also make our own money,’ the collector said.
Another collector in Ojodu Berger described a similar arrangement, saying collectors operate at designated points under the supervision of those who control the collection structure.
He said the proceeds are shared according to an agreed percentage, with collectors remitting a portion of what they receive to the person or group that authorised the collection, while retaining the balance as their share.
At Mile 12, BusinessDay found another arrangement involving young men known as ‘Omo Ilu’.
According to a source who did not want to be named, the group approached the market leadership, led by chairman Alhaji Jubril Uthman, popularly known as Sampam, with a proposal to create a collection opportunity.
The source said the market leadership subsequently engaged stakeholders connected to the local government or NURTW.
Under the arrangement described to BusinessDay, 70 percent of proceeds goes to the ‘Omo Ilu’, while 30 percent is shared with the local government or NURTW, depending on the collection arrangement.