ANAMBRA: Ogbaru Market Women Plans Half-Naked Protest *Calls for Secretary’s Sack*

BY NWEKE NWEKE, ONITSHA

Aged women who are traders at Odu Igbo-Ogbo-Azu section in Ogbaru Main Market, a suburb of Onitsha, in Anambra State have vowed to resist the alleged sack cum converting their sheds by the past leadership of the market under the  alleged full supervision of the Secretary of the market, Mr. Bukuno Agu.

Investigation into the allegation coming from the women who have widows in majority revealed that even after the tenure of the past administration in the market, Mr. Bukuno Agu is still supervising the erection of the structure, this it was learnt made the women to believe that Mr. Agu’s hands are not clean as regards their woes.

The women who claimed of having occupied the sheds when it was empty potion about 23 yeras ago, told journalists that despite the fact that they have their allocation papers intact from Ogbaru Local Government, Mr. Victor Nwawuzie’s led executive allegedly destroyed their goods worth millions of Naira during the yuletide break of 2019 and unlawfully erected shops in their sheds when they were still away for yuletide break.

The women who is laying claims as bonified owners of the controversial potion known as Odu-Igbo-Ogbo-Azu line in Relief Main market, accused the Secretary of the Market, Mr. Bukuno Agu of having written the script of theunlawful ejecting them from their sheds even as they called on Governor Willie Obiano to immediately sack Mr. Bukuno Aguas the secretary to the caretaker committee of the market.

Vowing to resist taken over their only means of livelyhood from them by their accused oppressors, the women who spoke to newsmen through their leader, Mrs. Josephine Nwanuta said they are planning to organize public half-naked protest in registering their grievances before the government of the State.

Collaborating the submissions of their leader, Mrs. Jacinta Okoha and Mrs. Francisca Ezeigbo respectively challenged Mr. Agu to come forward and state why the shops were built when traders had vacated the market for yuletide celebrations.

Reacting, the embattled market leadership Caretaker Committee Secretary, Mr. Bukuno Agu who has served as the general secretary and caretaker committee chairman respectively in the same market, dusted the claims of the embittered women, stated that the market is solely owned by the government; “and the owner of the market (government) has taken over the controversial potion”, he said.

He however accused the women of having in many occasions,destroyed the structure built by the government through the governmnet contractor.
Conducting journalists round the potion under contention, Mr. Agu said the potion was a motor park where dry fish treaders(Mangala) use to load and offload their goods before they relocateed to their permanent site even as exonerated himself from having hands with the allegation leveled against him by the women.