By Amos Odhe, Yenagoa
Barely 24 hours after viral media reports on the neglect of the new market site of the popular Okutukutu/Edepie Market in Yenagoa where the traders were forcibly relocated to by the Bayelsa State Government, Governor Douye Diri has undertaken an unscheduled visit to the new market site located off the Tombia-Amassoma Road to see things for himself.
Diri on Friday stopped his convoy to address the traders at the new market site on his way from the state’s airport, a statement by his chief press secretary, Daniel Alabrah, said.
The traders had on Thursday in separate interviews told members of the Federated Correspondents’ Chapel of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Bayelsa State Council, during a tour of the new market site, that they had not been making sales since the government forced them to evacuate the old market site on February 11, 2024.
They threatened to stage a protest on Monday if the Diri-admininistration continued to be insensitive to them and the environment of the new market site.
It was observed that the new market site, which is located in a marshy environment, prone to massive flooding, has a small part of it sand-filled for the traders to set their tables and display their wares, while a large portion has not been sand-filled.
The government forcibly relocated the traders to the new market site about three days to the second-term inauguration of Diri and his deputy, Lawrence Ewhrudjakpo, on February 14, as the road leads to the state airport through which invited guests would drive to grace the event.
It explained that the traders were carrying out their businesses on the right of way of an oil pipeline and that trading on top of the crude oil pipelines was dangerous.
Lamenting their woes to the journalists, the traders said they had been recording losses since their relocation as customers were not coming to buy things from them.
They said customers prefer to stop around the old market site where some private markets still exist, to buy the things they need instead of coming to the environmentally-poor new market site.
Speaking on their challenges, the chairman of Okutukutu/Etegwe Market, Alhaji Dahiru Yauketi, complained that the government did not prepare the new market site properly before hurriedly relocating them.
“The government allocated this place for us and relocated us from the former market. Government has not finished preparing this present place, but all of us agreed to come. Secondly, the government did not finish the road to this market. Customers are not coming to this (new) market place. We come here every morning but can’t sell anything”, he said.
Other traders including, Favour Sunday, Gladys Internet, Sunday Obi, Elo Edward and Madam Omo, who sell tomatoes and peppers among others, stated that apart from the lack of access road, there was no water, toilet facility and light around the new market site.
“One basic thing we want the government to do for us is road. Number two, there should be no private markets anywhere. When the government was closing that pipeline market, the governor told us that he will give us a site and everybody will move here. He gave us this site without a road, still we moved here and now we are seeing private markets everywhere”, Madam Omo said.
She added: “When you go to Okutukutu, by School Road, there is a private market. At the corner of one house, there is (also) a private market. Because of that, we that agreed to come to the new site are suffering. I have been here since one month ago and I have not sold one basket of tomatoes.
“So we need government to come and do the road for us; give us water, toilet, light, and seal (off) every private markets. That’s what we want the government to do for us now.”
Also speaking, a meat seller in one of the private markets, Gbenga Bamigboye, described the new market site as “a place not meant for human beings at all”.
However, Diri expressed concern over the inconveniences suffered by the traders in the new market site as a result of government’s inability to make the environment conducive.
The governor, according to the statement, said the new market site would be completed immediately his second term cabinet was formed.
Also, in a trending 10-second video, the governor is heard during the abrupt stopover at the new market site directing the Chief Security Coordinator/Coordinator of Bayelsa Community Safety Corps, Brig-Gen. Eric Angaye (retd) to “make sure that all of those people (traders in private markets) relocate here ( the new market site).”
Our correspondent reports that the private markets traders woke up the following morning to meet their shops burnt as security agents took over the area, ostensibly in compliance with the governor’s order.
