The Nigerian government has launched a sweeping crackdown on the country’s lead recycling industry, shutting down several major factories in Ogun state following revelations that their operations have been poisoning residents while supplying essential materials to the United States automotive industry.
The enforcement action, led by the National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency (NESREA) and the Ogun state government, targeted facilities in the Ogijo community, an industrial hub bordering Lagos.
The crackdown follows an investigation by The New York Times and The Examination that exposed how the auto industry has largely ignored environmental and human rights abuses in foreign recycling plants for decades.
For years, the town of Ogijo has served as a primary source of recycled lead for U.S. battery manufacturers. Trade records revealed that True Metals alone made dozens of shipments of recycled lead destined for the U.S. market.
While these materials powered American electric and internal combustion vehicles, the extraction process at home was devastating.
Residents described a “permanent shroud” of toxic smoke that blackened windows and coated schoolyards in “poisonous dust”.
In response to the growing scandal, East Penn Manufacturing, one of the world’s largest battery makers, announced it would immediately cease importing lead from Nigeria.
As the factories went silent, health officials moved in to catalogue the human cost. The Ogun State Ministry of Environment has begun a massive testing programme, sampling soil, air, water, and the blood of at least 500 residents.
While the Nigerian Senate has called for a task force to trace lead exports and coordinate a multi-million naira cleanup, many residents remain sceptical. For people who live within a mile of the True Metals plant, the closure is only the first step.
They urged the government to match their words with action, pointing out that the poison “is already in our bodies”.
“Children are dying slowly,” said Senator Mukhail Adetokunbo Abiru during a Senate session regarding the crisis. “Families have lived for years under poisonous smoke and dust.”
The preliminary findings show that over half of the children tested in Ogijo showed blood lead levels high enough to cause permanent brain damage and developmental delays, 100 per cent of workers tested at the primary recycling sites were found to have lead poisoning and soil samples in the community showed lead levels up to 186 times the recognised safety threshold.
