Newspaper Vendors in Aba, the commercial city of Abia state, on Friday, June 4, staged a protest against an alleged intimidation of their members by security operatives.
The vendors in their numbers, had the protest at the Nigerian Union of Journalists secretariat in Aba, lamenting over the constant harassment, abuse and illegal detention of their members.
The protesters with placards, called on security operatives in the city to allow them discharge their job without restriction. They also called for the immediate release of their arrested member, threatening to stop newspaper distribution in the city if their demands are not met urgently.
The aggrieved newspaper vendors who were chanting ” All we re saying, give us freedom” also had placards with inscriptions like;
” we say no to police brutality”
“security intimidation is too much”
” Enough is enough”
“Newspaper vendors deserves freedom”
” selling of newspaper is our business”
“newspaper vendors are not bandits”
“newspaper vendors deserves peace”
Speaking to ALL FACTS NEWSPAPER correspondent, one of the vendors said;
“the truth is that we are not happy, the vendors of Aba precisely are not happy. we are doing this protest to tell the city of Aba and all the people in Aba that we are not happy because of police intimidation.
” all of us are fighting to see how we will eat and feed our families but you can see today that police people are everywhere, instead of them to do what they are asked to do but they are looking after the vendors.
” we are all doing this thing to see how we can eat.
” as am talking to you right now, one of us is being detained in one of the police stations and we don’t know how to do it.
” they are asking us to bring N100,000. this is a sign of intimidation.
” this very man is an old man, over 70 years, they are detaining him.
” i heard they slapped this man, hell out of his eyes. a man of that age is crying in detention and they don’t care what kind of intimidation is that?
on if the vendors will stop newspaper distribution in Aba if the alleged intimidation persists. he said;
” its possible that we can stop selling newspaper because of the act . as am talking to you, if they don’t release this man, the vendors in Aba are to go for strike. we are going on strike if they didn’t release this man. so we are asking them to release this man with immediate effect”.
The arrested newspaper vendor Mr Anthony Acho, 77 was said to have been arrested on May 30, 2021. He is detained at SWART office in Eziama, Aba North.
As at the time of filing this report, the police is yet to give a response.
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