Worried by the number of criminals in the notorious Monkey Village in Area 1 Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) in collaboration with relevant security agencies, Tuesday, completely wiped off the village.
The notorious village at the back of the Federal Secretariat was known for criminals taking shelter and from where they unleash their criminal activities on innocent Nigerians in the area.
FCT Director of Security Services, Mr Adamu Gwary, while speaking to journalists at the site, lamented the level of criminalities being perpetrated by the people living in the village and the proximity of the Federal Secretariat to the village, noting that this is unacceptable. He added that all the offices, residents must be safe and secured.
According to him, “We all know the security implications of this type of shanties, where the Monkey Village is harbouring criminals and looking at the calibre of offices, like Federal Secretariat, you can see the proximity to these shanties and government cannot condone such illegalities and shanties and we have to ensure the government offices, residents, and other offices here are safe and secured.”
Director, Department of Development Control, Mukhtar Galadima, while fielding questions said the work is the continuation of the city sanitation that was ordered by the Minister of FCT, Malam Muhammad Bello a few months ago.
He lamented the abuse of land use in the area, one of which is the conversion of the road corridor to market, which according to him is unacceptable by the government.
He therefore urged all the owners of the land in that area to come and take over their respective properties in order to stop the squatters from coming back.
Senior Special Assistant to FCT Minister on Monitoring, Inspection and Enforcement, Ikharo Attah, said the belief that the Monkey Village cannot be removed is very wrong and that is why it has metamorphosed from shanty few months ago to full fledged house built with cement and mud, cement blocks.
FCTA demolishes notorious Durumi monkey village
