None of the tenants of the 21 shops operated by a private developer, UmmaKhalif Limited, at the Abuja Arts and Crafts Village, was arrested during police raid on Saturday, the proprietor of the company Engr Mahmud Mahmud said yesterday.
Officials of the National Council of Arts and Culture (NCNC), alongside truckloads of policemen, stormed the market and arrested 92 people.
Mahmud said in a statement yesterday that “none of our tenants of the 21 shops we operated was among those arrested by the NCAC and the police. All our tenants met today (Sunday) and none of them is in police custody.”
The proprietor urged the police authorities to enforce the December 18 court order issued by Justice A.S. Umar of the High Court of the Federal Capital Territory, ordering the NCAC to open the market pedestrian gates locked by its Director General Otunba Segun Runsewe last year, until the determination of the pending suit.
On June 23, 2017, Runsewe locked the pedestrian gate linking the market with Shehu Musa Yar’adua Centre and Silverbird complexes.
Days before the raid of the market, traders and artisans in the market under the auspices of the African Arts and Cultural Heritage Association (AACHA), petitioned President Muhammadu Buhari to restrain Runsewe from using police officers to harass them.
President of the association Nze Kanayo Chukwumezei told journalists Saturday that policemen arrested their members who were guarding the market since December 11, 2017, fire incidents that razed down 35 shops in the market and destroyed multimillion Naira goods.
He said the NCAC officials were escorted by truckloads of police personnel drawn from various police divisions of the SARS.
He said the NCAC and police action was coming just a day after an FCT High Court issued an order restraining the agency from taking any action against them or the centre, pending its resolution over their petition lodge with the court.
The traders said the raid “is a hatchet plan to realize a failed long ambitious of taking over our allocated shops; adding that the NCAC leadership had painted the arts village in black before various security agencies all in an effort to have his way.”
