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FCT Minister, Mohammad Bello has ordered the indefinite closure of Dei-Dei International Market following Wednesday’s clash between commercial motorcyclists and traders.
Bello gave the directive after inspecting the scene of the incident with the FCT Commissioner of Police, Sunday Babaji, Director, State Security Services with other sister security agencies and top officials of the FCT Administration.
He also directed the community and the market leaders to fish out the hoodlums responsible for the crisis.
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The death of a yet-to-be-identified woman in the area was said to have led to a clash between the traders and ‘Okada’ riders.
The crisis resulted in the destruction of goods worth billions of naira in the market while many vehicles were also destroyed.
He said: “The community and market leaders must fish out hoodlums and bad eggs among them, unfortunately this time around hoodlums carry arms and they shoot innocent people. As a matter of fact, I saw four corpses. This is very sad and totally unequivocally unacceptable in Abuja.
“We have agreed with security agencies that full scale investigations will be done, and the communities have to be part and parcel of the solution or else there will be no peace. In the interim the timber market and the surrounding markets, including all the activities on road that have clustered the road and made it impassable, will all stop until the technical team reviews everything, and then we will take the next decision.
He appealed to other communities within the FCT to go about their normal daily routine as there was no tribal or religious clashes in the FCT.
“There is no tribal or religious misunderstanding because all the leadership of various communities have lived here in peace for many years. This is simply the matter of criminals and hoodlums taking laws into their hands and we will not fold our arms and watch things go bad.”
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