Kabir Hamisu Matazu
11 July 2008
Abuja — Butchers doing business at Gwagwa area of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) yesterday complained about low sales and lack of fund to purchase meat to sell for the past two months.
Our reporter observed many of them sitting in front of empty tables.
Danlami Ibrahim Gwagwa lamented that the butchers in the area lack capital to purchase animals, adding that the FCTA should assist them by providing loans as well as security for their animals.
"We want the FCTA to also renovate the abattoir and provide cleaners," he added.
The butchers advised the FCTA to imitate the gesture of the government of Kaduna State, which gave butchers in the state loans of between N5000 to N10, 000 each, for them to boost meat production in the state.
"In the past, butchers pay a token fee of N100 per animals slaughtered but now it is N200 and the government collects this revenue without doing anything to improve on our welfare as we lack water and do our business under bad sanitary condition," the secretary of the butcher's union lamented.
Reacting to the report, the head of the butcher's association in the area, Alhaji Hassan Sarkin Pawa attributed the butcher's problem to capital, adding that many butchers left the trade during the demolition exercise of the last administration in the FCT.
"Prior to the demolition, we slaughter between 20 - 30 cows daily but now we only slaughter five cows and I have 30 children with 60 grand-children that depend on me," he said.
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