The All Progressives Congress (APC) in Anambra State has put Governor Chukwuma Soludo on task, to investigate the kidnapping incidents alleged to have been perpetrated by herdsmen in forests in Ukwulu in the Dunukofia Local Government Area of the state.
Recall that reports of raping and sodomizing of kidnapped victims allegedly by Fulani herdsmen had trended earlier this week, which the statement government had debunked in a statement.
Also, the traditional ruler of Ukwulu, Igwe Peter Uyanwa, and the leadership of the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association, MACBAN had debunked the reports.
But the spokesperson of the Anambra APC, Okelo Madukaife, has condemned the state government’s methodology of what he described as using press statements to fight crime.
Okelo said the statement issued by the State Government, through the Chief Press Secretary to the Governor, Mr. Christian Aburime on a core security concern, is hasty, preposterous, and shocking; hence condemnable.
“The surprising statement which remarkably was not issued from the Commissioner for Information ( if Anambra State Government has any) dismissed the narration of claims from a couple sharing their concerns on an attack by a certain group in a particular area with a profile of such previous attacks and plastered a political underlay over it, to the effect that it is the handiwork of political detractors.
“That is not the way governments work.
If indeed the right quarters of government digested that narrative that is full of specifics, the only thing that would have made sense at this stage is the acknowledgment of that narrative.
“The next logical cause of action as expected by all reasonable men and women of Anambra State, and they are in the majority, is to activate a proper discreet investigation into the facts availed in the admittedly anonymous expose, by opening a channel to profile the author.”
Continuing, Okelo said, “In 2021, an APC governorship aspirant was kidnapped in the lonely location described in the narrative and negotiated his way through family and friends after paying a princely sum.
“This matter having been properly incidented, ought to be embodied in the security reports available to the governor.
“If that is the case and if anyone in the Chukwuma-Soludo Government, which monopolizes the functions of 22 governments bothers to read these reports, that matter ought not to have been dismissed by a press Statement.”
The APC suggested that the State Government should solicit and elicit all possible and available assistance from all cadre of security agencies to unearth the truth about the supposed incident.
“We remain open to the possibility of the story being real or unfounded, but the author having been profiled in the first instance would in the latter case now be made to bear the consequences of misleading the government on sensitive security issues.
“It is bad enough that 25 months after a new government was ushered in in March 2022, not less than four local governments in Anambra State particularly in Ihiala-Nnewi axis are in captivity; cannot bury their dead at home or hold marriages or other ceremonies under the watch of a governor whose spokesman hastily declares his state as the safest that people want to tarnish.
“To allow Dunukofia LG, which by the way is home to Zone 13 headquarters of the Nigerian Police, covering Anambra and two other states get into that quagmire will be too much plague in a single four years.
“We urge the Government of Anambra State to arise and get its job done as we plead with all other commentators, be they traditional rulers, NGOs, or other clout chasers to pull back and let the matter at hand be investigated,” Madukaife concluded.
