Armed Robbery, Kidnapping, Cultism’re Still Rampant In S/E, Delta — IG

 

Inspector General of Police Solomon Arase has said in Awka, Anambra State capital, that armed robbery, kidnapping and cultism had remained rampant in the southern states of Nigeria.

The IGP, who chaired the security conference organized by the South East and Delta State governors, promised that the police would collaborate with the governors to provide adequate security in the zone.

Apart from Anambra State Governor Willy Obiano, Governors Ifeanyi Okowa of Delta, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu and Okezie Ikpeazu of Abia were  in attendance, while Governor Dave Umahi of Ebonyi State sent his secretary to the state government, Professor Bernard Odoh.

However, Imo State Governor, Owelle Rochas Okorocha was conspicuously absent.

The conference, held under the theme, “Security: bedrock of governance,” was also attended by the Director General of the Department of State Service (DSS) Hauwal Musa Daura, federal lawmakers, state legislators  and  traditional rulers.

Arase said the initiative by Obiano to hold a security conference not just for his state, but to also bring in his fellow state governors to form an alliance on ways to ensure the security of the states in the zone was commendable.

 

2 die, 4 injured as police, MASSOB clash in Onitsha

Two persons suspected to be members of the Movement for the Actualization of the Sovereign State of Biafra (MASSOB) were feared dead in Onitsha, Anambra Stateon Saturday, while four others, including a policeman, were critically injured in a bloody clash between some MASSOB members and the police.

The incident occurred along Oguta Road when a team of policemen had tried to arrest some commercial motorcyclists for plying Oguta Road, one of the routes prohibited for motorcyclists by the state government.

An eye-witness said the victims were shot dead by one of the policemen on patrol while trying to enforce the state government restriction of motorcyclists plying the route and, in the ensuing mayhem, the policeman’s AK-47 rifle allegedly went off and the bullet hit one of the victims who died instantly.

The death of the victim who was wearing the MASSOB insignia made the policeman start shooting sporadically into the air to scare the people in order to escape mob action. Stray bullets were said to have hit and killed the second victim and injured four others before the policemen escaped.

The Police Area Commander for Onitsha Philip Ezekiel, an Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP), confirmed the incident, but directed journalists to the Divisional Police Officer in-charge of the Central Police Station (CPS), Onitsha Isah Abubakar (CSP), who said information about the cause of the incident had not yet been ascertained because the policeman was so critically injured that he could not talk from his intensive care unit of the hospital where he is currently receiving treatment.

However, the Divisional Police Officer, DPO in-charge of Inland Police Station, Mr. Cosmas Ezeh, who also confirmed the incident, but explained that the MASSOB members who were coming back from their meeting, had first confronted the policemen on their way to buy fuel and met them at the point of the incident.

-Vanguard

Comments

comments