Just last week a popular market named after the Oba of Benin, caught fire. Or maybe it was set on fire. The fire started at one a.m. and burned until the dawn. Everything was gutted. Very few people, only those who lived close to the market, could salvage their wares.
A lot of people have suspected arson. Afterall, there had been acrimonious struggle concerning security arrangement in the market.

A week later, a popular park in the same city was hit. Four personal buildings lining the major road, the same road that runs from Lagos all through to Onitsha, caught fire, again in the middle of the night. No explanation has been given for it. And none seems forthcoming.

market security arrangement is becoming a gravy train for some people desperate to cash in around this city. Not least because women desperate to protect their wares can be browbeaten into complying with fees of any sort on demand. Sleight of hand, outright threat of bodily harm and seizure of stock can force tradeswomen to comply with the socalled hooligans in the marketplace.

Because of the finances involved in securing a market, many young and able bodied men currently run clandestine vigilante services in the name of market security, for which they get paid hundreds of thousands of naira pooled from women traders. And then there have been cases where they enlisted the help of local police to seize goods of "defaulting traders" until demanded payments were made.

Last week it was Edaiken market. This week it was Ramat Park. What market will be next? How do local women whose families depend on their contributions to the family purse start all over after losing everything they ever owned in the inferno? Seriously, there are families that don't eat unless someone, a mother to say the least, goes to market and sells something. Dinner doesn't come easy.