Residents Loot Warehouse Storing COVID-19 Palliatives in Yola

Malik Yahya/

Residents in their hundreds today looted food items from a government warehouse where COVID-19 palliatives were stored in Yola, the capital of Adamawa State.

The looters invaded the warehouse located at Kwanan Waya on the outskirt of Yola, carting away cartons of noodles, spaghetti, salt and cooking oil.

Young people who accused the government of hoarding what belonged to the public shared videos of themselves in the warehouse on social media, calling on residents to join them and partake of the loot.

A combined team of security operatives mobilised to the warehouse was eventually overpowered as the crowd increased with more people coming from the town.

The ever busy Yola-Numan  Road that connects the state with Gombe state has been blocked due to the high number of looters while police and other security agencies barricaded major routes to other private and public facilities in the general areal.

Security operatives reportedly foiled several attempts by the looters to access the Federal Government silo located in the area.

The Executive Secretary, Adamawa State Emergency Management Agency (ADSEMA), Dr Sulaiman Muhammad lamented the incident, saying the looters should have waited for government to distribute the items.

He explained that the government had already commenced the process for distribution and was making effort to secure items which were not supplied especially rice when the looters struck.

“We are yet to receive rice, there is no single bag of rice. We wanted to receive the remaining items including rice before we distributed them but with what is happening in the country, we decided to share what is on ground immediately, we were about to commence distribution,” he reportedly stated.

The Police Public Relations Officer in Adamawa State, DSP Sulaiman Nguroje said the police had sent reinforcement to prevent spillover to other facilities, advising parents to caution their ward against looting which remained an offence.

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