For more than two years, militants belonging to different groups, especially Dewell, Debam, and the Icelanders have held sway in two major local government areas of Akwa Ibom State, locked in a supremacy battle to dominate the affairs of the geopolitical entity of Etim Ekpo\Ukanafun axis.
Most of the affected communities in Etim Ekpo, include Oruk Ata 2, Ikpe, Ikot Esop, Iwukem, Abak Obong, Ikot Udobong, Otoro, Ibie, Udianga Enem, Obon Ebot, Obong Ntak, Ikot Edet and Ikot Ese group of villages.
In Ukanafun council, Ikot Akpan Ayara, Ikot Udo Obobo, Ikot Inyang Abia, Okoyo, Ikot Ibekwe, Nkek and other adjoining groups of villages, among several other communities, have been subjected to the authority of the insurgents, cowed and subdued.
The resolve government to deal with the militants rather than cowering them has further provoked them to wreak greater havoc. For example, the arrest of the wife of one of the dreaded leaders of the militants, popularly called ‘Englishman’, according to the chairman of Ukanafun Local Government Area, Uko Idiong, “sparked off mass seizure of the women in my village, Ikot Inyang Abia by the hoodlums.
“They claimed that as the council chairman, I was the only person that could direct the police to arrest his wife. He, (Englishman)’ called and threatened me that he was going to kidnap 25 women in my village for the arrest of his wife.
“Few days after, they (the militants) invaded my village and (several) women were kidnapped but were later rescued by the police in a bush in Ikot Akpan Ayara village,” he explained.
The ferocity of the offensive by the hoodlums, according to the House of Representatives member representing Abak\Etim Ekpo\Ika Federal Constituency, Emmanuel Ekon, forced his intervention, when stakeholders and traditional rulers of the zone, raised the alarm in a petition to the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Mohammed Idris.
“So far, the conflict has claimed over 200 lives and displaced more than 2,000 indigenes of my local government, Etim Ekpo and it’s not funny because many of the displaced people are sheltered in churches, people’s homes, shops, schools and other available spaces in my village,” Ekon lamented further.
Still miffed by government’s response to activities of the militants, Ukanafun local council chairman, Idiong accused Governor Udom Emmanuel, of paying lip service to what he described as “avoidable killings, kidnapping, armed robbery activities in the troubled areas” saying “the governor displays nonchalant attitude towards the problem.”
The state governor, Emmanuel, recently visited Internally Displaced Persons in the affected areas of Ukanafun and Etim Ekpo councils, to distribute relief materials, including bags of rice, beans, garri, toiletries, and beverages, as a way of providing succour to the victims, who are currently quartered at the Iwukem IDP camp. He was allegedly given a cold reception by the locals who were not happy at government’s weak efforts against militancy in the area.
For the government, the war against militancy has been a long battle. Earlier this year, the governor outlawed no fewer than 33 cult groups and directed the state Commissioner of Police, Mr Adeyemi Ogunjemilusi, to offer the militants a 21-day ultimatum, within which to surrender their arms and embrace the amnesty programme or face police action.
But what has become worrisome for Governor Emmanuel, Sunday Tribune gathered, was the militants’ turning of the guns on soldiers, policemen and other security agencies, killing them at will and dispossessing them of their arms.
For instance, it was learnt that more than 30 hoodlums, who attacked a military checkpoint at Iwukem, a border community on the fringes of Azumini, Abia State, dispossessed a soldier of his A-K 47 rifle and kits. Two policemen were also shot dead at Ikot Mkporikpo portion of Etim Ekpo- Iwukem road, about one month ago, while another was killed in the offensive against the hoodlums at a forest in Ikpe village.
Although CP Ogunjemilusi said the offensive yielded result with the rescue of hostages and arrest of some of the militants, he expressed fears that the war would not be easily won, going by the modus operandi of the militants in the difficult terrains of Etim Ekpo and Ukanfun.
“There are no good roads in those areas and we can’t access the difficult terrains without sophisticated equipment and ammunition. Our operations are hampered by lack of facilities and personnel to fight the criminals in their familiar environments,” he explained.
According to the CP, the police would require three Armoured Personnel Carriers (APCs) to be stationed in and operated across the three senatorial districts of Uyo, Eket and Ikot Ekpene, as well as eight marine gunboats, to effectively combat the menace of cultism, militancy and other violent crimes in Akwa Ibom State.
Although he commended Governor Emmanuel for being the single most important sponsor of the fight against the militants, some indigenes of the state like former Governor Godswill Akpabio who queried Emmanuel on the usage of security vote, were not impressed.
But Ekon, who represented the constituency in the House of Representatives, believed the violence that has displaced over 2000 people from their communities is politically fuelled.
“I told the governor that these crises are politically motivated; that he should do something to call the sponsors to order, but he only chose to listen to some political leaders in Etim Ekpo who lied to him that the matter is not as gruesome as painted.
“Based on the petition written to the IGP by elders and traditional rulers of my local government, Etim Ekpo, I had to forward the petition to the IGP’s office. The police conducted an investigation and discovered mass killings, including dead bodies and graves of victims.
“But surprisingly, some powerful political forces blocked the investigation because there are those in the governor’s administrative cabal that belong to the untouchable class because he believes he could only get the truth from these people,” Ekon lamented.
According to Ekon, who chairs the House of Representatives Committee on Local Content, “all public and private schools in the affected areas of Oruk Ata 2, Ikpe, Ikot Esop, Ikot Udobong and other adjoining communities have been shut down, forcing pupils to migrate to Iwukem High School, to write WAEC and NECO examinations,” saying the state government’s intervention by distributing relief materials to the victims was not enough.
Some of the victims who spoke to Sunday Tribune at their Iwukem IDP camp, recounted how their houses were set ablaze, livestock seized and most of the young girls kidnapped and used as sex slaves.
One of the victims, Otobong Sylvester Ukpong, a staff at the Ukanafun Area office of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), while narrating how he spent about two months in the kidnappers’ den inside a bush in Ikot Akpan Ayara village in Ukanafun Local Government Area, to Sunday Tribune said it was a sad experience.
“I was kidnapped on my way to work at Ukanafun by the Ikot Akpan Ayara section of the road by two gun-wielding men on June 5, 2018. They stopped the motorcyclist that carried me to Ukanafun at gunpoint, and forcefully made me to climb on their bike and blindfolded me.
“I was taken to a camp where they (the militants) had erected a canopy in the thick bush provided with cooking utensils and other items with heavy security to guard the place, while they negotiate for ransom,” he explained.
Ukpong said further that a ransom of N10m was asked for, but his family was only able to pay N600,000, forcing the hoodlums to keep him for two months until the Joint Task Force (JTF) stormed the camp to free him and eight others last month.
Although normalcy has returned to some of the affected communities, apprehensive residents are expressing fears of a resurgence of violence, calling on government to provide standby security guards in the villages “before we can return.”
“As it is now, there is fragile peace in some of those communities affected by militancy and it is not safe for us to return. There must be a standby security in the villages and appropriate financial compensation from government to enable us to pick up the remaining pieces of our lives,” Ubong Inyang, one of those at the Iwukem IDP camp taking refuge with his wife and three children, explained.
As the saying goes, “East or West, home is the best.” After spending weeks and months in an unfamiliar environment, most of the children in the IDP camps must be asking their parents when they would be going back home. But the answer is not that simple. It lies with the powers greater than the simple folks of the affected communities.
A renowned political economist and Director of the Commonwealth Institute for Advanced Professional Studies (CIAPS),…
The duo have spent most of their adult lives behind bars after they were convicted…
One aim is to reduce management layers, the spokesperson said.
JAMB stated that the review will incur no cost to the board.
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), in partnership with the Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBSS),…
Vice President Kashim Shettima has emphasised the importance of precision and discipline in national budgeting,…
This website uses cookies.