Abstract
The article examines the criminalization of street vendors in Abuja, Nigeria. It draws on the debate on informality, legality and rights, to highlight the tensions surrounding the law as a mode of regulation. As documented, ideology provides the rationale for the criminalization of street vending. The activity is deemed inimical to the modernist ideals of a clean and functioning city. Enforcement of the law is accompanied by the harassment of vendors. However, vendors remain on the streets by circumventing the law. The article highlights the shortcomings of a simplistic approach to the governance of informality. It cannot be legislated away.
Highlights
Street vending is an ‘omnipresent feature of the urban landscape’ (Cupers, 2015: 139)
Interviews conducted with officials of the Abuja Environmental Protection Board (AEPB), the agency responsible for municipal solid waste management (MSWM) and the regulation of street vendors, aimed to obtain information on the regulations governing street vending, their implementation and the nature of the relations with street vendors
The case study of street vendors confirm the practice of using the law as a disciplinary technology
Summary
Street vending is an ‘omnipresent feature of the urban landscape’ (Cupers, 2015: 139). The dependence on public space renders street vendors vulnerable because the ‘spaces, subjects and practices of street work’ are considered a threat to ‘an envisaged socio-spatial order and as a priority for intervention’ (Lindell, 2019: 3). The ideological, notably modernity and neoliberalism, pave the way for the criminalization of street vending by inspiring laws that proscribe the activity (Graaff and Ha, 2015). Accused of causing environmental degradation, among other problems, the government sees the activities of informal workers, street vendors, as a threat to the dream of producing a modern capital city. This article examines how the law is deployed to regulate street vending in Abuja and the tensions that emerge
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