Market traders accuse consultant of victimisation, seek Gov. Makinde’s intervention

Traders at Bola Ige International Market, popularly known as Gbagi, Ibadan, and the consultant engaged for the market by the Oyo State Government are now at each other’s throats over the alleged victimisation of the former by the latter.

Consequently, the traders, under the aegis of the Bola Ige International Market Traders’ Association, have called on Gov. Seyi Makinde’s urgent intervention to prevent the situation from degenerating.

Chairman of the association, Alhaji Ganiyu Adetayo, said in an interview with the newsmen on Monday that the traders had been subjected to untold hardship by the consultant, Afia Construction Limited, over shop allocation.

“We have had many market facilities managers before now, but what the consultant has been doing contradicts the good work of the governor.

“The governor was advised to increase our shop rents, but he refused because of his love for the masses.

“We have experienced high level of victimisation within two months of operation of Afia consultant in the market,” he said.

Adetayo said that the consultant held a meeting with them when it started operation at the market two months ago and he was told that the traders usually paid at the end of March every year.

“But to our surprise, the consultant started locking up our shops barely a week after the meeting, without prior notice.

“He also requested that we pay another N25,000 for shop allocation, which we had already obtained several years ago.

“The consultant also requested payment of another N30,000 every morning for the maintenance of the toilet facilities within the market. We have documents to back up our allegations,” he said.

The market leader also alleged that the consultant had been moving around the market with armed security men to intimidate traders into paying the shop dues.

“He has also converted the Gbagi market health centre to his personal office and those of his staff members, thus disturbing the operations of health officials at the clinic,” he said.

Adetayo called on the state government to give them another consultant, adding, “We don’t want him again.”

NAN reports that the traders had, on Friday, staged a peaceful protest within the market to express their displeasure with the operations of the consultant, with a declaration that they did not want the consultant again.

One of the traders, Mr Funmilayo Adeyemi, said that their shops had recently being locked up without any previous notice.

Adeyemi said in spite of the fact that the traders had met with the consultant and presented their shop allocation papers as requested, they were still asked to go and pay certain fees into a particular account.

She stated that most of the traders in the market had bought and got allocations for their shops for the past 20 years and had since been operating them.

Adeyemi said that traders were told to pay between N25,000 and N30,000, depending on the size and type of the shop.

She said that the shop extension and attachment complained about by the consultant were to protect their goods from being destroyed by sun and rain.

The trader alleged that the consultant had also been compelling them to pay for allocation of the shop frontage where they usually displayed their goods for customers to see.

Another trader, Mrs. Basirat Alubankudi, alleged that the account given to them to pay the fee requested by the consultant did not reflect the name of the state government as the beneficiary of the payments.

Alubankudi said that it had been difficult for them to do their normal business in the market due to incessant victimisation by the consultant.

She urged the governor to urgently wade into the issue in order not to add to the hardship already being faced by the traders in view of the current economic situation in the country.

According to her, most of the traders at the market operate with bank loans, adding that their woes should not be compounded by the consultant.

Responding to the allegations, the Chief Executive Officer of Afia Construction and Engineering Consultancy Limited, Mr. Adekunle Kareem, said that he only gave vacation notice to traders trading on the road.

Kareem, who described his firm as the facility manager and the IGR- designated company in charge of the market, said most of the traders who received the vacation notice were trading on the place designated for car parks.

“We have video recordings of when we issued quit notices to the those trading on the road within the market.

“This is an international market where things are supposed to be orderly. We want the market to look the way it was originally planned. Car parks must be used as car parks, not for trading or stores.

“We are not here to collect revenue on behalf of the government alone but to also to ensure that the market is organised and made to compare favourably with other international markets across the world,” he said.

Kareem maintained that he had never received any revenue into his private account, as alleged by the traders.

He added that the shop rents and development levies were being paid directly to the state government account which his company did not have any access to.

“The only money they are paying to our account as market facilities manager is the normalisation fee, which we are collecting on behalf of the state Ministry of Trade.

“We are not introducing any new fee. We are not the first consultant to collect the fee on behalf of the state government.

“Our predecessors also collected the fee on behalf of the government through their company accounts.

“Those behind the allegations are the ones who do not want progress for the market.

“Whoever has any evidence that we collected money into any private account or collected cash should come out and come out and show it,” he said.

Also speaking, the Director of Operations of the firm, Mr Segun Adebanjo, said that the aim of the company was to restore the market to its original plan.

Adebanjo said that some traders were in the habit of sub-allocating their shops, leading to massive revenue leakages for the government.

He said that some of them had disrupted the smooth flow of traffic within the market by extending their shops, as against the market master plan.

“In the main government data, some of the shops are single shops but some traders have created up to three shops and extensions out of them, leading to revenue leakages for the government.

“Worst still, some of them build the extensions under high tension cables, while others don’t have approval for the shop extension and attachments.

“We only ask them to bring their papers for clearance,” he said.