The Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) yesterday commenced a week-long massive demolition of illegal structures at Kuje to rid the satellite town of crime and mitigate the proliferation of illegal structures, purportedly obstructing human and vehicular movements in the area.
A few days after the Boko Haram attack on the Kuje Prison, the demolition followed months of sensitisation and the expiration of authorities’ notices to illegal occupants to vacate the area.
During the clean-up exercise, which lasted for about seven hours, hundreds of structures ranging from kiosks, containers, attachments to stores and worship centres, shanties and signposts encroaching on the road corridors were pulled down.
FCTA officials rolled in the bulldozers and dismantled roadside encroachments from the notorious Tipper Garage to the Kuje main market while some illegal squatters frantically salvaged some of their belongings before the demolition team arrived.
The Senior Special Assistant to FCT Minister on Monitoring, Inspection and Enforcement, Ikharo Attah, said the exercise was sanctioned by the FCT Minister, Mohammed Musa Bello and was under the guidance of FCT Police Commissioner Sunday Babaji and other security heads in the territory.
He said the minister was displeased with the extreme violations at Kuje, noting that the multiple contraventions like illegal settlements, extreme road encroachment, roadside trading, and encroachment of rail corridors made Kuje a very unsafe area.
He said the clean-up would be a week-long exercise, as Kuje had been very worrisome in some areas of insecurity.
“Today, we had been able to address the issue of roadside encroachment from Tipper Garage to the main market. We also touched the fruit market. Tomorrow, we will be claiming the rail corridor, the entire rail corridor and keep it safe, and children can use it for recreation,” said Attah. “We marked Kuje about four months ago. And we have been waiting for long, so the word of caution is what they have seen today.”
