• We’re no criminals; govt just wants to send us out of Abia –Market leaders
From Okey Sampson, Umuahia
Highway to Hell
The Umunneochi, Abia State section of the Enugu/Port Harcourt Expressway where the Umuchieze (Lokpanta) Cattle Market is located, could on all fours be described as the highway to hell.
That notorious area has been in the news in recent times for the wrong reasons. It has indeed become Abia’s ‘Gaza Strip.’
For years, kidnappers and other criminal elements have been prowling the Lokpanta – Umunneochi axis, making life unbearable for not only the residents, but also commuters who ply the Enugu/Port Harcourt Expressway.
No day or week passes without reported cases of kidnapping for ransom and other heinous crimes going on in the area. To put it mildly, activities of the hoodlums along this stretch has for long made going to Lokpanta and other communities in the axis something akin to travelling to the land of the dead.
If the recent revelation by Abia Governor, Alex Otti is anything to go by, it remains to be imagined how a market established for the slaughter of animals will turn a slaughter slab for humans.
Indeed, to many people, that stretch of the Enugu/Port Harcourt Expressway has not only become a kidnappers’ sanctuary, but has also become the criminals’ pathway to success.
Many have been kidnapped, maimed and killed in the area after huge ransoms must have been paid by their families.
Prominent among Nigerians abducted in the area with heavy tag on his head is the former Prelate of Methodist Church of Nigeria, Dr. Uche Kanu. The former Prelate was abducted in the area while on an Episcopal mission and only breathed fresh air again after the payment of N100m ransom.
War against kidnappers rekindled
Activities of these hoodlums in the area appeared to have defiled all solutions put in place in the past to checkmate it.
Last year, following persistent kidnappings along the area, the government of Okezie Ikpeazu set up a committee to tackle insecurity in the area. Despite the setting up of the committee, kidnapping has continued around the area which appeared to have put a question mark on the committee’s effectiveness.
But the then Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Eze Chikamnanyo, who was also a member of the committee said their job was not a one-off thing. “It is not expected that if the committee is inaugurated in the morning, in the afternoon, the kidnappers will all run away.”
Chikamnanyo revealed the Committee’s line of action then: “We have banned anything that has to do with okada at the Enugu/Port Harcourt Expressway Junction. That is where they have their informants. We have equally banned the operation of Keke beyond a certain time. We have done the massive clearing of the bushes along the major highways where the criminals used to hide and target their victims. To ensure better visibility, we have engaged in aggressive cutting down of those trees that obstruct visibility.”
While this did not yield any positive result, the Okezie administration came up with another security measure as was equally revealed by Chikamnanyo.
“The Commissioner of Police, Abia State has been mandated to draw up logistic requirements for mounting six additional checkpoints at strategic locations across Umunneochi LGA.
“Governor Ikpeazu hereby directs that all settlers, herders and individuals residing inside the forests around Umunneochi LGA to vacate such locations with immediate effect.
“Government can no longer guarantee the safety of any person or group found to be residing in the forests around Umunneochi LGA.”
Government also directed that: “All cows and herders around Umunneochi LGA are hereby restricted strictly to the cattle market located at Umuchieze until a final decision is reached concerning the menace in the cattle market.”
Since all measures put in place by the previous regime in the state appeared like pouring water on the back of a duck, the present administration has decided to tackle the security challenge along the Umunneochi corridor frontally, adopting a fresh and holistic approach.
Abia Government, in its frantic effort to fight and dislodge kidnappers along that route, took far reaching decisions against the Umuchieze (Lokpanta) Cattle Market which it alleged had been used by kidnappers and other criminal elements to commit heinous crimes in the area and beyond.
Operation Crush
One of the major reasons the Abia State Government under Dr. Alex Otti established the Operation Crush, a security outfit, was to tackle security challenges emanating from the Umunneochi axis of the state.
In setting up the security outfit, Otti said: “Abia State would no longer share any part of its territory with criminal elements and their sponsors. Hoodlums should leave the state immediately or be crushed.
“The goal of this initiative was to counter incidence of kidnapping and armed robbery in the state and as such, security personnel involved in this operation should pay special attention to flashpoints, especially around Umunneochi and Isuikwuato axis, Aba, Umuahia and other parts of the state.
“I admonish the security personnel to be brave and ruthless to the criminal elements and at the same time guard against harassment of innocent citizens.”
The governor informed that the Operation Crush was a joint taskforce comprising the Police, Army, Navy, DSS and NSCDC and its aim was to identify and respond swiftly to security threats anywhere in the state.
Otti made it clear that those who harbour and provide assistance to the criminals would be dealt with according to the law. He urged Abians as well as residents to volunteer intelligence and useful information to enable the scheme succeed as hotlines would soon be made available for such information.
True to type, operatives of the Operation Crush were reported to have recently raided the Cattle Market and the adjourning areas and made startling discoveries.
Startling revelations
On Sunday, October 29, Governor Otti while addressing the press in Umuahia, made some startling revelations said to be part of the discoveries made by security agents when the cattle market and its environs were raided.
The governor revealed that security operatives in the state discovered 50 decomposing bodies, over 20 skulls and many human skeletons around the cattle market.
Otti further revealed that apart from kidnapping and armed robbery going on in the market, prostitution, narcotics trade and other criminal vices were high around the Lokpanta Cattle Market.
Otti said since after the raid of the market which necessitated the bringing down of some brothels inside the market, there was now calm in Umunneochi.
He made it clear that his government was committed to tackling the issues of insecurity head-on without minding whose ox was gored.
Decisive decision
To ensure insecurity was tackled head-on in the area, Government took far reaching decisions.
Said the governor: “In order to tackle the criminality going on in and around the area, the Lokpanta market would become a daily market that would open at 6am and close at 6pm.
“The market would now become a general market as sections will be alloted to the cattle dealers and other businesses too.” Otti also informed that his administration was equally fencing the market at a huge cost to government all in an effort to ensure adequate security.
Otti stated that the Lokpanta area was notorious for kidnapping and armed robbery, hence the decision of his administration to make the market a daily one, adding that the decision was taken after a meeting with the leadership of the market.
“We are single minded about rooting out insecurity in Abia State. Because we know that no government can succeed in the face of insecurity, violence, armed robbery and kidnapping.” The governor who promised that gadgets would be deployed at strategic points in the market to ensure the security of lives and property in the state, added that his administration was poised to ensure Abians enjoy a great Christmas this year.
No decomposing bodies found here – Cattle dealers
As the imbroglio rages, cattle dealers at Lokpanta Market who were disturbed by the governor’s press briefing, have reacted. In a statement signed by their leaders and read out by Buba Abdullahi, a copy of which was obtained by Saturday Sun, they denied involvement in any criminal activities. In a six-page statement signed by 14 of its leaders and read by the vice chairman, Buba Abdullahi Kedemure, they said the state government’s allegation of discovery of decomposing bodies in the market was to say the least not true, but to “give a dog a bad name in order to hang it.”
Hear the traders: “Investigation available to us from the security agencies in Umunneochi Local Government Area indicated that the decomposed bodies, headless bodies and skeletons were not either in the cattle market or around it.”
The traders also wondered: “Who are the relatives of the 80 decomposed bodies, 20 headless bodies and human skeletons discovered in the cattle market?
The allegation by the Abia State Government is meant to give a dog a bad name in order to hang it. In other words, the government wants to chase us away from the land we have occupied since 2005 and create tension across the country.”
They said the northern community living and doing business in the market does not operate any brothel in the market as those recently pulled down were owed and run by natives.
On government’s decision that the cattle market should be non-residential, the leaders of the traders said: “Considering the high rate of crimes in Umunneochi today, it will be a tactical mistake for us to relocate to various communities in Umuchieze. We passionately appeal to His Excellency to allow us to live in the cattle market.”
Appeal to govt
Most of the cattle dealers who spoke to Saturday Sun appealed to Gov Otti to rescind his decision of making the market non-residential. Auwal Audu is a cow dealer. He has this to say: “Most of us were born and brought up in Umuahia and we have no other place to go should the governor stick to his decision.” Audu said asking the cattle dealers to leave the market and reside in the adjourning villages was akin to asking them to leave the state.
“Most of our cows arrive from the North at midnight exhausted, and we need to attend to them from that moment to survive.” Another trader, Musa Bello, while appealing to the governor to allow them stay, said: “Asking our people to live in the villages will not be easy. Apart from the fact that some of our cattle arrive the market in the middle of the night, we have over 15,000 persons living inside the 80 hectare landmass and the three villages surrounding the market cannot contain us. “People will say while in Umuahia, we were not living inside the market. It was so because that was inside the town and there was security. But here, we are talking of a place inside the forest.”
Some Igbo traders inside the market, including Uchechukwu Ukairo, Eze Igbo, Umuchieze Cattle Market, Uche Ohakwe, Okechukwu Nwoga and Sunday Ndukwo, all appealed to the governor to change his mind about making the market non residential.
We should have been involved from the beginning – Community leader
The host community has no traditional ruler since their Eze died some years back. There was equally no official of the town union to speak to when the reporter visited the area. However, a community leader spoke anonymously for security reasons.
He said the people are in support of whatever government is doing to tackle insecurity in the place. Although he blamed government for not involving the host community when the area was given out as cattle market so that they could be able to, from day one, help checkmate the excesses of the herders, he said they are ready to assist government in bringing lasting tranquillity to the area.
“The cattle market is like a safe haven for criminal elements among the herders and their relations. Wherever they commit crime in the South East, they go there to hide because nobody was coming after them there,” he said.
