Wike demolishes popular kilishi market in Area 1, Abuja

The Kilishi market in Area 1, Abuja, has been demolished by the Federal Capital Territory Administration (FCTA) under the leadership of Nyesom Wike.

Kilishi is a type of dried beef, akin to jerky, made from cow, sheep, or goat meat and is popular in Nigeria.

The demolition, which occurred on Monday morning, followed a notice issued the previous Sunday by Muktar Galadima, the Director of Development Control at FCTA, during a meeting with traders and shop owners at the Area 1 shopping complex.

The purpose of the meeting was to discuss and reach an understanding with the traders and shop owners before carrying out the demolition.

Galadima mentioned that the presence of attachment shops, unauthorized constructions, and parking lots had rendered the roads around the complex impassable.

However, Aminu Maradun, a kilishi trader at the Area 1 shopping centre, revealed in a conversation with THE WHISTLER that the officials had informed the traders only about a need to clean up the area, not about the demolition.

Maradun expressed surprise upon discovering the demolition of the market when he arrived at the site on Monday morning. He highlighted that they were only informed the previous day to move their belongings for maintenance purposes, but they were not notified about the demolition plans.

“I am surprised, I don’t know what is happening. They are demolishing the Kilishi market. They only came here yesterday and told us to shift our things because they wanted to do some work there, but they didn’t tell us they wanted to demolish the market. Only for them to come very early to demolish the place.

“Honestly, we never knew it was going to be a demolition. I was called by my people who told me what was happening, by the time I got here around 8:30 a.m. they had already gone far.”

“The whole thing has disorganized us, especially me,” he added.