By Festus Fifen.

Illegal Settlers of Ruga villages and Shanty communities around Kukwuaba, Airport Road have vowed to resist every attempt by the FCT Administration to vacate them from the settlement.

The settlers expressed their frustration on Tuesday when the FCT Administration joint task team on city sanitation known as Operation Sweep carried a cleaning exercise in the community to remove all the illegal structures there.

Speaking during the exercise, the Secretary, Ruga Community kukwuaba, Ibrahim Yusuf said this is the 22nd time the community is facing demolition stressing that the occupants will continue to re-erect their structures until they are properly resettled.

Yusuf noted that the community contributes immensely to the socio-economic development of the territory having been one of the affordable neighbourhoods within the city where artisans and labourers reside.

He insisted that members of the community cannot live in satellite towns outside the city centre due to the high cost of transportation and therefore see the persistent efforts from the administration to vacate them from the settlement as an exercise in futility.

Speaking earlier, the Director, Security Services Department of the FCTA who led the operations, Adamu Gwary, explained that it was aimed at ridding the city of miscreants and vandals.

Represented by the Secretary, FCT Command and Control Centre, Peter Olumuji, he expressed concerns that their continous illegal occupation of the land is preventing their original owners from coming to develop them.

He called owners of the land to quickly take advantage of the current sanitation exercise embarked upon by the FCT Administration to commence development of their lands.