The contractors said every job was inspected, verified, cleared, and forwarded for payment — but the Minister allegedly refused to endorse the final release.
A coordinated police crackdown on Wednesday left dozens of Federal Capital Territory (FCT) contractors gasping for air after officers allegedly acting on the instructions of FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike, fired tear gas to disperse them.
This was after they barricaded the Minister’s office in protest over ₦5.2 billion in unpaid contract funds.
The protesting contractors who barricaded the entrance of the office on Tuesday morning said they were only demanding their verified earnings, accusing Wike of seizing their payments for nearly two years without explanation despite multiple certificates of completion issued by FCTA departments.
“This is deliberate economic strangulation. It is financial terrorism,” the Chairman of the coalition, Chuka Muojindu, told journalists shortly before the protest was dispersed.
According to official documents shown to SaharaReporters, the unpaid sum — ₦5,211,503,589.50 — covers contracts executed between September 2023 and May 2024, all under Wike’s supervision. They include drain clearing, sewage evacuation, medical procurement, borehole drilling, school furniture, and public materials supply.
The contractors said every job was inspected, verified, cleared, and forwarded for payment — but the Minister allegedly refused to endorse the final release.
One of the protesters narrated how the prolonged withholding of payments has triggered mass medical trauma among contractors, many of whom took loans to execute the projects.
“Over five of our members are dead already. High blood pressure, depression, shame,” he said, adding that several others have lost homes, marriages, and sanity due to unpaid debts.
He also disclosed that a pregnant contractor lost her baby weeks after begging FCTA officials for her payment.
“She went from office to office pleading. Nothing happened. Days later, she lost her pregnancy. Whoever kept that money has her blood on their hands.”
In one case described as “state-backed humiliation,” a contractor, Mr. Benson Ehuwa, reportedly sent a WhatsApp message to Wike begging for payment so he could send his children back to school.
Instead of empathy, he was allegedly dragged, arrested and dumped before the Minister.
“Wike insulted him and handed him to the police. Even after officers went to the sites and confirmed he executed the contracts, he was still dragged to court for ‘harassing a public official’,” he said.
On August 15, 2024, the group staged what they described as a “silent protest” at the FCTA Secretariat—not blocking any roads, not chanting slogans—but police reportedly stormed the gathering with tear gas, batons and shields.
“We were just standing with banners. Suddenly, canisters started flying,” a contractor recounted.
“Some police officers confessed privately that they were under strict order: ‘Disperse them, no negotiation’.”
The Association claims it wrote repeatedly to the Minister, appealed to his aides, and even sought intervention from the Presidency.
“President Tinubu told him to pay. He ignored the President,” Muojindu alleged.
They also petitioned the Senate and House leadership — but nothing has changed.
“What crime did we commit? That we delivered our contracts?”