Newspaper vendors protest police intimidation, harassment in Abia

Newspapers and Magazines Distributors Association, under the umbrella body of newspaper distributors and vendors, Aba branch, on Friday, protested incessant intimidation, harassment and arrest of its members by security operatives in Aba, the commercial hub of Abia State.

The vendors, irked by the arrest of Anthony Acho, a 77-year-old colleague by the police, threatened to go on strike from Monday, June 6, 2021, if their member is not released by the Police.

According to them, Acho, a hypertensive patient, had been in police detention since Saturday, May 30, 2021, when he was arrested from his newspaper stand at Ama Ogbonna, by Special Weapon and Tactics (SWAT) team from Eziama, in Aba North Local Government Area of Abia State.

Mr Ike. C. Ike, chairman of the association, disclosed that Acho was arrested at his newspaper stand by SWAT operatives.

He said that all efforts made by them and his family to bail him had proved abortive, as the SWART operatives were demanding for One-Hundred-Thousand Naira (N100,000) for his release.

He said, “Our member has been in police custody since May 30, 2021, at the Eziama office of SWART. This is as they have also refused to allow his family access to where he is and to give him his hypertension drugs, insisting on a bail fee of N100,000, which the family cannot afford.”

The association, therefore, appealed to the Abia State Commissioner of Police and the State’s Commissioner of Information, to intervene and see to the release of their member.

The association observed that the clampdown of vendors, whose responsibility is to distribute hard copy newspapers to the public, is another form of gagging of the press.

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