Edo State Governor, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, has apologised to the
widow whose wares were confiscated at the Oba Ovonramwen Square, Benin
City last week. Speaking to a delegation of Federation of Muslim Women
Association of Nigeria in Government House, Benin City, at the eekend,
Oshiomhlole said: “I regret my action.”
According to the Governor: “Last week, I had an encounter with a young
lady at Oba Ovonramwen Square by Mission Road. She was trading on the
road and too many people have been doing this. They block the road with
their wares. Part of the problem of Benin before now is that it is so
difficult to drive round the city.
“That also affects the economic, social and commercial life of the city.
The people cannot move from one place to the other. Where you could
have spent 30 minutes, you are spending hours. We have various officers
we have assigned to keep the roads clean, to keep the walkways clean so
that people can walk. As you may have noticed in the past, there was no
street in Benin City that had a walkway.
“But you find some of our women; they just convert the road to trading
post. For years we have been sermonizing. I came across this young lady
who chose to put her wares right on the road, thereby creating blockade
and obstruction. We are all human and in my anger I said to her, how
would you be doing this? I asked them to confiscate her wares”, he
said.
Explaining further, Oshiomhole said: “She told me ‘I am a widow’ and I
said if you are a widow, must you do things that would make other women
widows. By this obstruction you have caused, you could cause accident.
You could actually get knocked down.“In the process I probably said
something that I should not have said. I want to say that I do
appreciate that I come from a very poor background. I understand the
pains of the poor. We also need to be careful so that the poor do not
create more problems.“Just to say to our women that I regret having said
what I said to her. But I am troubled by what I see sometimes. We spend
tax payers’ money to build roads so that people can walk and yet some
of these things happen. I regretted that particular action but help us
to preach to our women to try and respect the right of way”, the
governor urged the FOMWAN officials.The governor further charged the
women thus: “I would encourage you to propagate the virtues of Islam and
as mothers, you should preach peace and love which Islam represents. By
your actions, you are helping people to recognize that we are all
brothers and sisters belonging to one large family”
Oshiomhole admitted that this is a difficult time for Nigeria; the level
of poverty is high, adding that a lot of women are challenged as single
mothers.
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