For two days, the biggest market in Ikorodu division at Sabo was under lock and key for what is now a near regular feature in that commercial nerve center. The five players involved in that market enterprise, namely the state government, the Ikorodu local government, the developer(s), the Iya Oloja in council and the traders were again in conflict.
The Lagos State Building Control Agency had ordered the closure of the market on Thursday, February 23, 2017, sending thousands of traders and their customers into the nearby roads, streets and corners.
Like the EFCC and other government agents, who seal off business premises, a conspicuous notice was placed at the main entrance of Sabo market along its western flank. The three gates of the big market, which have been operating at full peak in the past eighteen (18) months were locked down.
At first, it was not clear the cause of the market closure, especially coming soon after a major protest late last year to the palace of Oba Kabiru Shotobi by traders, who complained bitterly about high cost of renting the shops which led to shutting down the market for some days.
Oriwu Sun was at Sabo market on Thursday, 23 and Friday, February 24, 2017 and the once mighty market place was desolate. It was like a scene in Boko Haram’s North East Nigeria.
This big place, which used to bubble for twelve (12) hours in the day and used to host thousands of buyers and sellers daily, was deserted as if it was a war zone.
Stranded traders filled the entire corridors of the market along the Northern and Western axis. Many struggled to enter their shops to pick one or two valuable items but could not penetrate an aggressive barricade at the entrances manned by tough looking men with a no nonsense posture.
The few, who managed to get inside to retrieve one or two things, dared not display any item for sale nor stayed beyond stipulated time.
No one could give any explanation on what was wrong. They could only figure out that perhaps, the council or the market authorities did not pay certain dues to the state government; hence, the closure. No market official was willing to speak. Frantic phone calls to the Iya Oloja yielded no facts on the first day of the shutdown.
By Friday, February 24, the situation had become desperate. The patient traders, who had spoken to our correspondents on the first day of the closure now became highly agitated on the second day, especially those, who sold perishable goods and those, whose customers were on their necks as well as those whose monies were hanging in a balance.
A sizeable population of the traders had converted the entire length of Sabo round-about, down to the second gate along Itoikin road, into an emergency market. People suffocated to pass through layers of emergency hawkers, who had taken over even the cow assembly point along that stretch of road facing the big petrol station at Sabo.
There was a spillover effect onto the roads, which created traffic gridlocks along Itoikin road and the one leading to Alhaji street (Ogunshi road).
Could anyone have blamed the traders, who had to survive, especially those whose daily bread are tied to daily market activities?
Looking at the million or billions of man hours lost and the damage done to productivity in that commercial center, one could not blame the traders, who are on the receiving end of every power play, money play, and policy play by the big actors in the system and drivers of the market economy.
A ray of hope came when Oriwu Sun crew, led by the Deputy Editor-in-Chief, Mr. Chuma Adichie, the News Editor, Muftau Jimoh, trainee journalists, Teslim Abiodun, Islamiya Abioye, Dorathy Elaigwu and our veteran driver, Rasheed Aderibigbe succeeded in meeting the Iya-Oloja herself.
She welcomed the Oriwu Sun crew and spoke brilliantly to explain her position on the matter and threw light on other thorny questions we tabled before her.
The interview took place at her office near the second gate of the market facing empty lines of shops, deserted streets and an empty market place.
Sabo wore a pathetic look like an abandoned village. The once neglected market in the 90’s and first decade of the millennium, 2000, which became a busy, bubbling and fully occupied market thriving in high volumes of business and bursting at its seams (boundaries), had in two days become a ghost place. It had become a victim of a quadrangular chess involving the state, the local government, the developers and the market authorities led by Alhaja Taofikat Allison, the Iya Oloja.