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| The suspects |
What would have been another national calamity was recently averted when soldiers from the Asa Military Base
of 14 Brigade, Ohafia Barracks, Abia State, on Sunday arrested 486 suspected Boko Haram members, including eight girls. The arrest was made same day bombs were
uncovered and defused in a church in neighbouring Imo State.
This shocking event SHOWBIZPLUSng
can authoritatively report is already causing fear and panic among indigenes
of the state, mostly parents.
The suspected insurgents were said
to be going to Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital in search of work.
The suspects were arrested at about
2 am when their vehicles were intercepted by soldiers between Arungwa Junction
on the Enugu-Port Harcourt Expressway and Imo Gate, the Abia State and Rivers
State boundary.
They were said to be moving in a
convoy of 35 Hummer buses when they were intercepted. However, two of the buses
were said to have escaped arrest.
According to Abia State Commissioner
for Information, Mr. Eze Chikamnayo, who briefed journalists, yesterday at the
military base in Asa, Ukwa West Local Government Area of the state, where they
were being detained, the suspects are aged from 16 years upwards.
Chikamnayo who was accompanied
during the briefing by the Commander in-charge of the battalion, Lt. Col.
Rasheed Omolori, who also confirmed the arrest, said that the suspects
allegedly came from Kano, Taraba and Jigawa states. They were said to have
claimed that they were going to Port Harcourt in search of work.
Lt. Col. Omolori, who however
declined further comments on the arrest, said that a report had been forwarded
to Army Headquarters, Abuja.
The commissioner, however, said that
further investigation would assist in unraveling the true mission of the
suspects but insisted that “the movement was suspicious”.
Chikamnayo commended the Army and
other security agencies in the state for their vigilance and urged them not to
relent.
Some of the vehicles which have been
impounded by the Army authorities have the number plates: Jigawa RNG 98XA; Osun
RLG 176XA; Kano AF 411 DAL; Lagos BDG 487 XK; Abuja EP 86 ABC and Bauchi ZAK 48
XA, among others.
Imo’s 8-point security measures
Meanwhile, the Imo State Government has announced far reaching security
measures, following the botched bomb attack targeted at the Living Faith
Church, Winners Chapel, Owerri.
Announcing the eight-point measures,
yesterday, in Owerri, after several hours of special security meeting he held
with security chiefs and a cross section of Imo people, Governor Rochas
Okorocha, said that government would summarily take over uncompleted buildings
found to be hideouts for criminals.
“Uncompleted buildings in the cities
in the state and environs without security guards, will be taken over by the
government because criminals use them as hideouts”, Okorocha said.
The governor, who branded the
security measure as “operation know your neighbour”, also ordered hotels in the
state, to install security cameras and should on a daily basis, forward a list
of all their guests to the Director of State Security Service.
“Trailers bringing food items from
the North would no longer be allowed to come into the state at night but only
during the day and the food items would be off-loaded at a designated place,
off the state capital”, Okorocha said.
While saying that lands left fallow
for several years and not used for any economic or gainful purpose but taken
over by criminals, will be seized by the state government, the Governor also
banned the smoking of Indian hemp anywhere in the state.
He warned residents in the state to
be very careful with broken bottles, cans, leather bags, parked tankers and
vehicles around their homes, public places and public buildings.
“Traditional rulers in the state are
directed to summon emergency meetings of their various communities to take
stock of strange faces living within their autonomous communities”, Okorocha
said.
The Governor then announced that
government has concluded arrangements to meet all non-indigenes in the state,
adding that nobody comes into a state to commit crime of any kind without an
internal collaborator.
It was the considered opinion of
Okorocha that since those who commit these crimes are human beings, they must
also be residents somewhere, and their neighbours should equally be able to
know them and what they do.
Boko Haram can’t be allowed in
S-East— Obiano Meantime, Governor Willy Obiano of Anambra state, said yesterday
that the Islamic Terrorist group, Boko Haram will never be allowed to have a
stronghold in the South Eastern part of the country.
Speaking with State House
Correspondents after the governors of Enugu, Abia Anambra and Ebonyi states
paid a solidarity visit to President Goodluck Jonathan, Mr Obiano said the
governors of the South East were watchful of events in the country and would do
everything to ensure that the sect’s activities do not get to the region.
According to him, the governors were
in the Villa to assure the President that despite the challenge of insecurity,
the people of the South East are with him.
On the possibility that Boko Haram
may extend its activities to the south East, the governor said: “No, they can’t
get there; I can assure you of that. We will not allow that to happen. I can’t
tell you in any material details about bombs found or not found. All I can
assure you is that we are very alert in the South-East and we are watching what
is going on. I can assure you that Boko Haram cannot come to the Southeast” he
said.
On the visit of the governors to the
President, Obiano said: “The South-East governors came this morning to assure
him that we are with him all through the way and that he can count on us.
“The President is a human being and
he is under a lot of pressure and some other people are making the work a lot
more difficult for him. Instead of supporting him to steer us out of these
stormy waters, they are adding kerosene to fire. So we are here to tell him
that we are supporting him and that he should count on us” he said.
On the erosion ravaging parts of the
South East, the governor said that the World Bank with the state governments
are working on a lot of erosion sites already.
“They have expanded the four erosion
sites they are working on currently to 12; so they are adding eight more
erosion sites. I believe that this intervention which is 50/50 per cent
contribution will go a long way in helping to tackle the erosion sites we have
in the state.
“We are also tackling erosion from
the legal point of view. Bush burning will no longer be allowed, so also is
cutting roads to lay pipes to houses. These are some of the factors that lead
to erosion. We want people to do the necessary things that they should do; we want
people to stop termination of drainages abruptly. We are putting a law in place
to ensure that anybody that violates the law will face the consequences” he
said.
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