NAN reports that the traders in their hundreds barricaded the main entrance to the Abuja Municipal Area Council and the FCTA secretariats.Godfrey Ojarikre, chairman of the association of UTC shop owners, said some FCTA officials had, in the early hours of Tuesday, arrived at the market and demolished its perimeter fencing without prior notice and knowledge of the traders.“We woke up on Tuesday morning to discover that the fence of the complex had been demolished.
“In 2021, we had the course to go to court to douse the tension that was brewing between us and the market management. It took us by surprise that on Dec. 25, 2020, we came to the complex only to discover three billboards erected by Urban Shelter, that they want to remodel the market.“And from that 2020, they have not been relating with us, but rather they have been fraudulently relating with our tenants who are traders in the market.
“Then the department of development control came and wrote quit notice on March 30, and our lawyer wrote to them to remind them that the case is in court. We thought the matter has ended, only for us to come this morning and noticed that the fence to the complex has been removed.” Ojarikre said the FCTA used security operatives to harass his colleagues despite the fact that they were legal owners of the shops.
He appealed to the authorities to shelve the demolition and put proper plans in place to remodel the market.“Majority of us that are retired civil servants who used our pensions and gratuities to erect the permanent structures. Even if they are remodeling, at least they needed to meet and discuss with the real owners of the shop in the complex,” he said.
Its Systematic land grabbing in FCT
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