Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Nyesom Wike, on Thursday, May 9, warned against unnecessary protest in the Federal Capital Territory.
Wike isued the warning when traders from the Apo Mechanic village, besieged the entrance of the FCTA secretariat, demanding that the FCT minister sign the lease agreement to enable them to move to their permanent site at Wassa District
He said there should be due process before any protest is embarked upon.
He maintained that any other action would be considered an attempt to intimidate the government.
The traders who carried different placards commending the developmental strides of the Minister, however, appealed to him to sign the lease agreement which was entered into in 2015.
The chairman of the association, Chimezie Ife, said his members were tired of waiting since 2006 to be allocated their permanent business environment, having spent over N100 million.
He explained that since 2006 when the old Apo mechanic village was demolished with a promise for a permanent location, they waited until 2011 when they applied for land, but were forced to spend over N100 million over time by officials of the Administration.
Despite the efforts and expenses, he lamented that the traders are yet to be allocated their land. This, he added, had prompted a series of demonstrations against the administration with the hope the current FCT minister, Nyesom Wike would address the lingering issue.
Wike, who was not impressed by the actions of the traders, berated them for neither writing to his office to discuss the delay in the implementation of the lease agreement nor to inform him of the protest.
The angry minister said he considered the protest as being sponsored, seeing that there were no bases for the protest.
“If this is the way you support the government, then I don’t need it. Is this the way you support the government by barricading the road and obstructing of traffic without informing me of anything? You never wrote to me that you want to see me or that we refuse to see you. Then what you will do is to wake up in the morning, and barricade the road and barricade the gate, and then you are saying you are supporting me? Then I don’t need your support.
“What I don’t like is intimidation. If you have a problem, channel your problem to me and if I don’t solve it, then you can take another step.
“Something that has happened since 2015 and you didn’t take any step. Ministers have come and gone, and then I just came and I haven’t received any letter from you till today, saying there is a problem we are having and we think you can help us to solve the problem. Then all of a sudden you are coming to say the good things are doing. What good things? Then you don’t need the good things.
He therefore asked them to go back and follow due process for a solution.
Wike said: “What you should do, is tell your people to go, then write that you want to see me, and then we will sit down and talk. I am not one of those ones anyone will come and intimidate. Barricading the road I don’t like. People coming to tarnish the image of government is not right when we can sit and dialogue. If the government has promised to give you land then I will look at the papers. Then write to me so that I can listen to you.”