Ahead of the official lockdown of Abuja, residents yesterday rushed to markets to buy food stuffs and groceries to stockpile in their homes. The scramble gave traders opportunity to hike the prices.
President Muhammadu Buhari had on Sunday evening announced restriction of movement in Abuja, Lagos and Ogun States, starting from Monday 11 PM, as part of procedures adopted to contain the COVID-19.
When our reporter went around Abuja on Monday morning, he saw residents rushing to markets, supermarkets and shopping malls to make last minute shopping that would see them through the 14-day lockdown imposed by the Federal Government.
It was observed that shops selling food stuffs and other essentials such as toiletries, sanitizers, were crowded with shoppers at Wuse Market but many were seen using face mask and also observing the social distancing advice.
As a result of the scramble of shoppers to beat the lockdown, shop owners took advantage to hike the prices of goods.
Some shoppers who spoke to City News lamented the sudden increase.
Rukaiyatu Isa said “They have increased the prices of the stuffs because of the high demand. People are rushing to stock up that is why the market is filled today. I think this is not the right time to increase prices of goods”.
Another resident, Charles Agbo, said the money he came to the market with could not buy the stuffs he intended to buy because the prices had increased.
“The prices of food stuffs, sanitizers, toilet papers and other essentials have all skyrocketed and people are complaining,” he said.
At Utako Market, the market securities with the aid of police officers were restricting shoppers from entering. One of the security opratives told City News that only shoppers who want to buy food stuffs were allowed into the market.
“We are not allowing people enter because of orders from above. Only those that will buy food items are allowed to enter. Only shops that are selling food stuff are opened here. Even the banks are closed,” the source added.
Residents were also seen rushing to fill their tanks and very vans at service stations around Wuse, Jabi and Utako, and because of the panic buying there were queues and traffic jam around the filling stations.
City News also gathered that customers trooped into banks around Wuse, Jabi, Utako, Karu, Jikwoyi, Nyanya and other districts of the FCT to withdraw money.
