Police arrest shop owner and son in South Darfur

A merchant and his son were arrested on Monday when he refused to pay a weekly fee to the military force in Gireida, South Darfur, on Saturday.

The state and the Chamber of Commerce announced in June that each merchant has to pay a fee of SDG200 as an incentive to the military force every week. Members of an operational police force, who have been deployed in order to protect farms, are sent to collect the payments.

An activist in Gireida told Radio Dabanga that the police visited the shop of merchant Saleh Abdelrahman at Abuja market. Abdelrahman replied that he did not have enough money to pay the fee.

“After a discussion, the policemen arrested him together with his son Mohamed Sabir Ali, who assists his father in the shop.”

They have been taken to the local military garrison where the headquarters of the operational police is based, the activist reported.