MULTIPLE PROTESTS ROCK BENIN CITY

Traders, transport Waste Board workers take to the street
Multiple protests rocked different parts of Benin City about the same
time on Wednesday as residents organized under different groups and
associations took to the streets to protest peacefully different
government actions and inactions.
In what experts and observers described as a continuation of what has
become the democratic marker of Edo State under Comrade Adams Aliyu
Oshiomhole, a former leader of the Nigeria Labour Congress, who is
famous for leading similar national protests against past governments
both at federal and state levels, the different protests terminated at
the gates of the Government House in Benin City, where the respective
leaders of the protesters submitted their messages and demands to the
government.
The protests began at the sprawling and popular Oba Market at Ring
Road, where traders took to the streets, causing traffic jams and
noisy distractions in protest over the alleged imposition of N3, 000
on each of the about 10, 000 market traders by the Chairman of Oredo
Local Government Area, Hon Osaro Obaze.
The money demand, which the embattled council chair said would be used
to settle the N12.5m electricity debt his administration met on
ground, however drew the ire of the traders, who asked the council
chairman to account for the millions he collected from the traders for
a similar purpose in November last year.
While our correspondent gathered that the market has been in utter
darkness for a long time now owing to the huge debt that resulted from
past administrations' mismanagement and embezzling of electricity bill
in the council, the traders have kicked against the latest effort of
the incumbent administration made to tackle the issue of darkness in
the market over lack of accountability.
Commercial transport operators took to the streets about the same time
elsewhere at Five Junction in Uselu, under the jurisdiction of Egor
Local Government Area over the issue of colour-code enforcement, a
security related directive to police and the related harassment of
drivers and commercial transportation operators in Benin City by the
state government task force, Edo State Transport Management Agency
(EDSTMA).
Like their trading counterparts, the drivers and conductors took their
protests to Edo State House of Assembly and the Government House.
In the same pattern, the state government workers under the employment
of Edo State Waste Management Board also gathered at the Government
House to protest a new directive from the Ministry of Environment and
Public Utilities to the workers to immediately resume Sunday work in
view of the dirty nature of streets in the state capital, allegedly
signed by a Permanent Secretary of the ministry, Ms. Gillian Ochugbue.