Activities of gunmen in the South-East of the country has continued to scare not only investors but organizations as several conferences billed to hold in the region in recent times have been shifted elsewhere.
A conference of lawyers scheduled to hold in Owerri, Imo State was taken to Port Harcourt while that of the Nigerian society of engineers slated for Enugu was taken to Abuja.
The latest is the 42nd Supreme council convention of the Order of Knights of Saint Mulumba of the Catholic faith billed for Owerri, Imo state which is now holding in Asaba, Delta state with members from all over the federation and Cameroons in attendance.
Addressing a press conference on the four-day event in Asaba on Thursday, the Worthy Supreme Knight of the order, Sir Diamond Ovueraye said members couldn’t have taken the risk of holding the convention in the Imo state capital or any part of the region.
According to him, the Knights had to return back to Asaba where the convention held last year after consultations due to activities of unknown gunmen in the South-East.
” Well, as they say, man proposes but God dispose of. You are well aware of the rather worrying security situation in the South-East in the not too recent past and its huge implications.
“Our 2021 supreme council convention was billed to hold in Owerri but sadly had to be moved to Asaba on account of the activities of unknown gunmen and other security infractions that made our going there untenable”, Sir Ovueraye posited.
The theme of this year’s convention is “Normalization of the abnormalities in the context of Nigerian society,” which the leader said was apt on account of issues bedeviling the nation.
He said the Knights have the onerous tasks and very challenging duty to speak out against the ills of the society even as they have aligned themselves with the position of the Catholic Bishops Conference o Nigeria ( CBCN).
On the proposed pump price of fuel and N5,000 grant to every vulnerable person in the country to cushion the effect of the policy, the Worthy Supreme Knight said ” I don’t think we are ready for it” adding that in as much as the removal of subsidy is ideal, the federal government should first of all build more refineries and make petroleum products available to Nigerians.