FCTA’s Bulldozers Demolish Illegal Structures In Karu Market
Bulldozers of the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) on Tuesday took out illegal structures and shanties erected on walkways and parking lots at the popular Karu Market.
Senior Special Assistant on Monitoring, Inspection and Enforcement to the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Minister, Mr Ikharo Attah, explained that the market was badly ‘contaminated’ with structures built illegally.
Attah, who led the operation, said many persons coming from satellite towns like Kurudu, Gidan Daya, Maraban Loko, up to Karshi had to go through the Karu site because they could not go through the road in front of the Karu market.
According to him; “Because people trade on the road, the market appears to be badly ‘contaminated’ with structures and shanties built on all the walkways and parking lots. Therefore, we have to clear the road to actually free the market and the road corridor.
”Anybody that lives in Nyanya, Jikwoi and Karshi axis road will know what this spot means. It is a spot that people don’t transverse. Many people coming from areas like Orozo, Kpgye, Pyanko up to Karshi pass through a lot of difficulties before they will access the road.”
He assured that the cleanup of the market would be sustained to prevent people from building illegally in and around the market, adding that the market had not been sanitised against illegal structures and shanties in the last six years.
Insisting that the market was completely bastardised for six years, Attah said; “That is why we had to come in and we got the blessings of the Sakaruyi of Karu, Emmanuel Yepwi, who insisted that we can’t have the road leading to the palace blocked.
“If the road is blocked it actually defaces Karu and paints Karu in a very bad light and for this big cleanup we did; no one is going to come back here in the next three years’’.
Speaking on the development, Divisional Head of Planning, Land and Survey, Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC), Mr Nbede Micheal, lauded FCTA for clearing all the illegal structures and shanties in the market.
“One of the major issues here is trading activities, totally blocking the major express road on a daily basis. Thank God for the work done by the FCTA; is work well done, but we are going to put all measures in place to sustain the new outlook of the market.”
Nbede said; “We are going to station AMAC Marshalls to checkmate whosoever that is going to put anything on the ground in the undesignated places within and around the market. Even though we have a private developer, who is already handling the market, we will fence the whole market so that we can together safeguard it”.
In another development, the Sakaruyi of Karu in Abuja Municipal Area Council (AMAC) of the FCT, Yepwi, has decried the increasing rate of illegal structures in his domain.
Yepwi, who spoke when the Senior Special Assistant on Monitoring, Inspection and Enforcement to the FCT Minister, Ikharo Attah, visited his palace in Karu, appealed to the FCT Ministerial Committee on city sanitation to urgently remove the illegal structures and shanties in his domain.
He alleged that the illegalities were being perpetrated by some criminal elements, living in makeshift shanties and other illegal structures within the community.
Karu is a major satellite town located on the major road corridor linking Orozo and up to Karshi area of the nation’s capital territory. – NAN
