Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) has restated its promise to give adequate protection to contractors and workers handling different road projects in the FCT.
The administration also vowed to deal ruthlessly with anyone found to be obstructing construction of any public interest projects anywhere across the territory.
The FCTA director of Development Control, Muktar Galadima, stated this when he led a taskforce team comprising personnel of different security agencies to Shehu Shagari road in Gwarinpa District, where it was reported that some miscreants had attacked some workers of CBC Global handling the ongoing N16 arterial road project.
The team, having condoned the entire area, moved to cashew trees by the road side which not only housed all manner of shanties, but also suspected criminal elements who have become security threat to the area and ensured its total removal.
Galadima, during the exercise explained that the operation was in line with the directive of FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike, who had mandated that all necessary security provisions should be made available for the protection of contractors executing different projects in the territory.
“Our job on the project site is to make sure that some illegal structures are not preventing the work. So we have done the needful by removing the illegal structures and shanties. So, if there is any reaction or protest by any other person, there are security agencies that are responsible to take care of that.
“The issue of cashew planting has to do with the indigenous communities, trying to up the value of their properties and crops, but several times we found out that these cashew trees provide a safe haven for many people of the underworld,” he said.
The secretary of FCT Command and Control Centre, Peter Olumuji, disclosed that the administration got the report that as soon as the company, CBC Global, mobilised to site in the area on Friday last week, they were attacked by some hoodlums, who not only destroyed some of their equipment but also injured some staff members.
“In fact, we thought we would be able to apprehend one or two of them, but what we gathered here from our intelligence unit is that those who caused that mayhem have all disappeared because the people here are protecting the good work of the FCT administration.
“They told them they cannot harbor such people in their midst, so they had to chase them away before we even got here and the work has been going on peacefully throughout today,” he said.
