Police in Niger State say they have arrested a 30-year-old mother, Aisha Jibrin, and 24 others, for allegedly masterminding the recent protest that erupted in the Kpakungu area of Minna, the Niger State capital.
In a statement by Police spokesman, Deputy Superintendent Wasiu Abiodun, a large number of women and miscreants mobilised themselves and blocked the Minna-Bida Road and the Kpakungu Roundabout, claiming to be protesting against increases in food price, causing obstruction on the highway, and deprived motorists, travellers, and other road users from gaining access to attend to their lawful businesses.
The Police command, according to him, immediately drafted police patrol teams, led by the Deputy Commissioner of Police, Operations, DCP Shehu Didango, to the scene, and after much persuasion, the protesters deliberately refused to clear the road for public use.
The statement further added that while the Deputy Governor of Niger State, Yakubu Garba, equally availed himself at the scene and addressed the group, they turned deaf ears, and chose to be violent.
Abiodun added that the police adopted minimum force to disperse the protesters who turned violent, by attacking the police with dangerous weapons such as stones, bottles, sticks and cutlasses, and damaged police patrol vehicles and parts of the Kpakungu Police Division roof.
The police further claimed that, in the course of dispersing the protesters, they arrested the initiators of the protest; 30-year-old Aisha Jibrin, 57-year-old Fatima Aliyu and 43-year-old Fatima Isyaku, all of Soje ‘A’ of Kpakungu area of Minna, and twenty-two other alleged miscreants.
According to the police, some exhibits were recovered.
They included a bench and a stick used as a barricade, three knives, one scissors, one cutlass, one saw-blade, one iron pipe, four other sticks, two wraps of Indian hemp and charms, among others.
During interrogation, the police allegedly said Aisha claimed that she was not aware that her action was illegal, by mobilising over one hundred women and miscreants to block the highway for a violent protest.
She claimed further that she informed one youth leader, Hassan, in the area, who promised to inform the police of their plan to protest.
Meanwhile, all the suspects have been taken to the State Criminal Investigation Department, SCID, Minna, and will be charged to court for prosecution.
Police say effort is ongoing to arrest other identified members of the alleged violent protest.
The Commissioner of Police, CP Shawulu Danmamman, has urged the people of Niger and members of the public to be law-abiding, adding that they should not resort to self-help, but approach appropriate authorities to address issues, whenever they arose.
