ORIGINAL inhabitants of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja led by their traditional ruler, the Sa’Peyi of Garki, Dr Usman Nga-Kupi, on Thursday, stormed the office of the Head of Civil Service of the Federation, Abuja to protest alleged marginalisation by the Federal Government.
According to one of the leaders of the protesters, Abdul-Mustafa Abdullahi Zuba, this is just the beginning if nothing is being done by the government, the issue of Abuja will be more boiling and more serious than that of the Niger Delta that is why the residents have taken it upon themselves in thousands despite the restriction of the security personnel.
They demanded, among other things, that the Federal Government should henceforth appoint Abuja indigenes as FCT minister and Permanent Secretary so as to be part of decision-making at the Federal level.
The protesters who had converged on the entrance of the Head of Civil Service as early as 6:00 a.m were later dispatched by the security operatives before they regrouped and caused serious gridlock within the area.
In their various inscriptions which read thus: “FCT is sitting on a timed bomb; enough is enough Permanent Secretary for FCT is a must do; Permanent Secretary for FCT should not be contemplated; how can there be peace without justice?”, further threatened that if government failed to address all their grievances and agitations, they might resort to violence.
Abdullahi Zuba who is the Secretary of the Abuja South Indigenous Youth Forum said “we have been marginalised and we cannot keep standing anymore, we can no longer sit and watch this thing happening, the ministerial issue, the House Representatives issue.
“Our people are being chased out from their houses and farmlands on daily basis because we did not react, because we are so kind and accommodative, we will no longer tolerate it”, he added.
Also speaking, the Secretary General, Coalition of FCT Indigenous Association, Barrister Christopher Dada said “we need a Permanent Secretary for FCT, we discovered that in the recent exercise for the appointment of Permanent Secretary by the Civil Service, three of our people were shortlisted but along the line music changed and they were saying that they were not qualified, they were not shortlisted so this is a major thing we want to know and constitutionally we are qualified.
“In the past days, we have Dr Aboki Jawa, an indigene of FCT who was Permanent secretary of many ministries, especially ministries of Education and Petroleum Resources and many others, so why now the government wants to deny us?”, he questioned.
Addressing the protesters, the Director of Special Duties, Office of the Head of Civil Service, Mr Olusade Adesola promised to deliver the messages to the Head of Service for onward delivery to the Presidency.
Addressing newsmen in his palace at Garki village after the protest, Sa’Peyi of Garki, Dr Nga-Kupi said he was not believe in violence, hence the decision to go on peaceful protest.
He lamented that government was not ready to listen and “we don’t want our youths to resort to violence because we don’t buy the ideas of people demonstrating or violence but our prayer is that government should listen to the people because that is the essence and the beauty of the democracy.
“I have said it before because this is the seat of government, it is wrong when the decisions are taken and the original people are not represented this may create the wrong impression but if we have representatives, he will come and field the people that this government policy that we should key in and cooperate with them but when our representatives are not there it will not augur well.
“Whatever belongs to the FCT provided it is Federal Character issue we should be given, ministerial slot, Permanent Secretary slot and other things that belong to the FCT that are taken to other states should be given. We don’t want a situation whereby youths will be coming out to protest”, he pleaded.
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