About 250 beggars in Ibadan, on Thursday, April 1, protested against low patronage by members of the public following a recent rumour that they sell money received from people to ritualists.
Spokesperson for the indigent beggars, Imam Abubakar Abdullahi, Serikin Hausawa of Hausawa Community, Oja’ba, Ibadan, who spoke to Vanguard, said the rumour has created deep hatred for his people.
“The reports that some wealthy people are buying money from beggars, including the physically-challenged people, for money rituals are not true. As a result of the claim that some ritualists do buy money from these beggars, there has been public resentment against these innocent people,” Abdullahi said.
“What we know is that traders, hawkers and commercial drivers do come to these beggars who are mainly blind and lame people, to change money (get smaller denominations). We need to clear our names so that people will not be punishing us for offences we don’t know anything about,” he added.