FCT natives decry rejected bills, threatens massive protest

Natives of the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja have faulted the National Assembly for rejecting Mayoral Status and Ministerial Bills.

The FCT natives threatened on Sunday to stage a massive protest that would shut down the territory if the National Assembly failed to revisit the bills.

The mayoral status bill seeks to confer a mayoral status on the FCT, while the ministerial bill seeks to empower FCT indigenes to become FCT minister.

Speaking at a press conference organised by some FCT stakeholders on Sunday, one of their leaders, Yunusa Yusuf, vowed that the natives would no longer tolerate the marginalisation meted on them by the government.

He said the natives would block all entries into the FCT, mostly the Airport Road and ever-busy Zuba-Kubwa Expressway until their demands are met.

Yusuf said, “We want to warn clearly that since we are not considered as Nigerians like other citizens, the lawmakers should be visiting this FCT as if they are also foreigners coming to a foreign country. Since we are not Nigerians and we lack identity, the country has nothing to offer us.

He urged the National Assembly to revisit the bills saying the natives would not wait for another four years to present the bills again.

“From now, we have decided that we are not going to wait for another four years. We are going to take our destiny by force. By this, we are calling on members of the National Assembly to rescind their decision on our bill or we stage a massive protest that would shut down the territory.

“It is not news that we have brought this bill before the National Assembly before and it failed to scale through, now we brought it again, the National Assembly members still denied the bill from scaling through. This is bad and inhuman. This time around, we cannot wait for another four years.”