By Daniel Tyokua
The officials of Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) on Tuesday, cleared unapproved buildings around old Federal secretariat in Abuja.
During the exercise, the officials said the number of criminals that stay in the area was becoming worrisome and must be addressed.
The area which they described as ‘notorious village, serve as shelter for criminals where they hide and launch attack on innocent Nigerians in the area.
Director FCT Security Services, Mr Adamu Gwary, told Journalists that the level of criminalities that were being perpetrated by the people living in the village, considering the proximity to the Federal Secretariat was a threat to security.
“We all know the security implications of this type of shanties, where the Monkey village is harbouring criminals and looking at the Calibre of offices, like Federal Secretariat , etc that are here , and you can see the proximity to these shanties and government cannot condone such illegalities and shanties and we have to ensure the government offices, residents, and other offices here are safe and secured”.
Mukhtar Galadima, Director, Department of Development Control, while fielding questions from Journalists, said the work is the continuation of the city sanitation that was directed by the Minister of FCT, Malam Muhammad Bello, few months ago.
He lamented the abuse of land use in the area, which is the conversion of the road corridor to market, which according to him is unacceptable by the government and therefore must be removed.
Galadima, therefore urged all the owners of the land in that area to come and takeover their respective properties in order to stop the squatters from coming back.
Senior Special Assistant to Minister of FCT on Monitoring, Inspection and Enforcement, Ikharo Attah, said the ‘Monkey village’ was removed because of increasing wrong doings.
Attah said, “The Monkey village in Area 1 has gradually turned into full fledge house built with and blocks. The land actually belong to Nigerian Police and whatever they are planning for the future they haven’t started using it, so the people moved in and they became so notorious and with criminal hideouts.
