Stakeholders of Onitsha Main Market in Anambra state have pleaded to Governor Chukwuma Soludo to consider building extension that would accommodate increasing population of traders instead of demolishing the existing structures.
The stakeholders maintained that demolition of ten thousand shops as the Governor planned would not only throw millions of traders into perpetual frustration but also bring untimely death among the affected and trigger social vices in Anambra State.
Speaking to journalists, stakeholders and traders in the Market suggested what the Governor should do instead of moving ahead with the demolition.
The Chairman of Frontline Bright Street, Onitsha Main Market, Chief Martins Emeronye, who is also a former Chairman of Mandela Square, Onitsha Main Market for the period of fifteen years, opined that if Soludo should go on with the planned demolition, armed robbery, kidnapping and social vices will take over Anambra state.
According to Emeronye, one shop in this Market feeds ten persons everyday; but when such shop is demolished, there would be much more social vices and untimely death.
“We beg Your Excellency to understand that demolishing shops in the existing shops in the Market would be counterproductive.
“When I first arrived Onitsha Main Market in 1985, there were parking spaces for vehicles, as observed by Governor Soludo; but as population of traders increases, arrangements were made to accommodate them.” Chief Emeronye noted.
The Chairman also reminded the governor that there are alternative motor parks where vehicles visiting the Market pick and drop traders and customers, pleading Soludo to consider the traders and have mercy on them.
Also speaking former secretary of Mandela Line, Main Market, Onitsha, Mr. Alpha Ogbonnaya, commended the governor for his plans to build modern Market for traders, but suggested that there are ways he could do it without hurting traders.
Ogbonnaya, therefore, suggested that Soludo’s government should build brand new Markets elsewhere, so that the brand new Market would co-exist with the existing ones, for the benefit of both the traders and state government.
“If the planned demolition is executed, it will cause a lot of havoc. High blood pressure will kill thousands of traders. If you demolish a trader’s shop, you have indirectly telling him to go and die”.
“Each shop you see here represents many persons: father, mother, average of 4 children, in-laws, house boys and girls, kits and kins. It is from these shops that traders feed their families, train their children in schools, pay house rents and hospital bills”.
“Traders are praising Your Excellency on your plans to build befitting Market. But at the same time, we suggest that Your Excellency can build an extension of Onitsha Main Market at the empty land at Nwangene.
“On the alternative, Your Excellency can relocate some section of this Market to the Bridge Head Drug Market, when the Ogbogwu traders must have relocated to their new site. This idea can decongest the market, and everyone will be happy.” Ogbonnaya concluded.
Equally speaking, the immediate past Chairman of Onitsha Main Market, Chief Innocent Ezeoha, gave vivid explanation of why Onitsha Main Market deviate from it’s original master plan.
“In 1984, there was heavy fire outbreak that destroyed many structures in this market. After the incident, there were massive renovations by the successive governments that affected the initial master plan. Again, in 1997, there was another fire outbreak.
“More structures were affected. There was massive demolition and erection of new structures by the various State administration and allocated the shops to traders. Since then, the Market was no more the same and some government officials who reconstructed the shops are commissioners and still serving in government” Said Ezennia.
“Again, every year, the Market produces thousands of new traders graduating from apprenticeship. To accommodate them and new structures are built. So, the Market has immensely developed and expanded more than in the past”
He asked the governor to relocate some section of the market elsewhere as measure to decongest the Market, instead of demolishing already built shops.
Chief Ezeoha expounded that Johnson street is the center of Onitsha Main Market where goods are conveyed to trader’s shops and no longer street, saying he has severally explained it to commissioners when he was the Onitsha Main Market Chairman.
He further added that Security tower that controls Main Market’s security net work was built at Johnson street, expressing that it is not to the interest of traders if the security tower is pulled down on the cause of demolishing shops.
He said, “Ogbo Abada was in this Market before it was relocated to the new site at the Bridge Head. Building Materials Market was here before it was relocated to its permanently site at Ogidi expressway.
” Electronics Market was here at Ogalonye street before it moves to Premier Brewery site. I can continue to count. So, Your Excellency can develop more sites and relocate some business concerns instead of demolishing existing structures.” Chief Ezeoha posited.
“We will assist our Govrrnor to achieve his proposed project and as a listening Governor, I have confidence that he will call us so that we can explain to him more. So, whatever things affected Onitsha Main Marke has also affected the entire South East and many families will suffer” Chief Ezeoha stated.
A patrons of Bright street, Chief Chukwudi Izunwanne, described the planned demolition as a terrible idea, and asked the governor to have a change of heart.
The Secretary General of Bright Street Amalgamated Traders Association, Nnamdi Ede, also expressed that the governor’s planned demolition of shops in the Market would increase insecurity, suggesting that if the governor feels there are structures obstructing pathways and drainages, he could instruct lines executive to remove them.
Chief Ezennia Moris, a former Chairman of FCT Line in the Onitsha Main Marke also told the governor that population of traders in the Market is not the same today, as it was the time it was built. He reminded the governor that traders in Onitsha Main Market voted massively for him during the recent governorship election, and begged him not to pay traders back with demolition of their shops.
Lending his voice, Hon. Onwuka Samuel, who is the chairman of No. 9 Bright Street, Main Market, said destroying shops in the Market will increase tension and destroy the economy of the state.
Angel Network News (ANN) recalls that Soludo, had marked over 10,000 shops for demolition at the Onitsha Main Market, giving traders a 14-day ultimatum to vacate.
Soludo insisted that traders build structures on pathways, parking spaces and drainages without asking themselves questions, how vehicles and people would be able to move round the Market without hitches.
The 14-day ultimatum and period of grace given by Soludo have elapsed, and the governor is set to start-up the demolition.
