By Myke Uzendu, Abuja
Some hoodlums on Monday, raised down a car mart housing over 50 cars at Apo Mechanic village in Abuja expressing their angst on the continued protests against police brutality and extra-judicial killings by the #ENDSARS movement.
The cars, displayed for sale were set ablaze by the thugs which appear to have been hired to disrupt the #ENDSARS protests.
It was gathered that the miscreants had attempted to attack the demonstrators at Apo during their rally on Monday morning but the protesters overpowered and repelled them.
But by the time the hoodlums reinforced and came back to the scene, the #ENDSARS protesters had dispersed for the day.
It was learnt that in anger, the hoodlums descended on the car stand at Jesus Avenue, along Apo Mechanic Village, setting it ablaze.
Eye witnesses said that the thugs vandalised other valuables in the area while harassing innocent passersby.
Amateur videos of the mayhem surfaced on the internet on Monday evening with visual of the raging fire at the car mart.
An eyewitness, who spoke anonymously for security reasons, said: “The hoodlums began the attack around 3:30pm. My colleague and I were driving home when we saw people running helter-skelter near the mechanic village.
“We had to park our car on the premises of Apo Shoprite for safety reasons and run for our lives.
“We also saw those who set the cars ablaze brandishing machetes and small knives to intimidate and scare the people away.”
The source added that some policemen were in the area while the mayhem lasted but they were too few to stop the hoodlums.
As at the time of filing this report, efforts to reach the owner of the burnt cars did not yield positive results.
