Chairman, Abia State Inter-Ministerial Committee on COVID-19, and Secretary to the State Government, Bar Chris Ezem, during a visit to the market described as unacceptable the low compliance with the COVID-19 protocols.

He said the Abia State Government has no plans to adjust the Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays market days in view of the rising cases of the virus in the state and warned that if the traders continued to flout the state government’s directive, the state government will have no choice but to enforce total closure of the market.

Ezem said,

If we find out they are not complying with our directives, we will be forced to withdraw what we have and order a complete lockdown of this Ariaria.

What we are going to do next is that anywhere we find this continued breach, we will order a total lockdown of Ariaria. I will come here, seal the place off and tell the Commissioner of Police to put an enforcement team and the gates will be locked up.

The committee sealed off a complete line in the market for flouting the COVID-19 protocols and for attacking some members of the team enforcing compliance.

Justin Nwosu

Justin Nwosu is the founder and publisher of Flavision. His core interest is in writing unbiased news about Nigeria in particular and Africa in general. He’s a strong adherent of investigative journalism, with a bent on exposing corruption, abuse of power and societal ills.