Investigation: How Amaechi and Wike fuel beheadings in Rivers state

 – Communities have witnessed a hike in the price of wooden caskets

– Different cultist groups gang rape, murder and rob residents of Omoku community

– The Nigerian police are attempting to halt the violence but can only operate with the only resources provided for them

– Omoku community is responsible for over 20% of Nigeria’s total oil output with hundreds of oil wells exploited by Italian oil giant, Agip

Immediately visible as one comes to Omoku town through Ndoni, in Ogba/Ndoni/Egbema local government area (ONELGA), Rivers state, are hurriedly put-together wooden caskets being traded. Residents say this trade is now a business thriving like no other in many communities in the oil-rich state.

To understand the increase in sales of caskets in Omoku for instance, 28 people including a family of five, a father and his children, were massacred on March 12, at about 9pm. Some of the victims were beheaded and their heads taken away by the killers, an on-the-spot investigation by NAIJ.com confirms.

Since relatives, fortunate to be alive themselves, must nevertheless bury their dead, Omoku and its neighbouring crisis-engulfed communities have witnessed the economic principles of demand and supply operating. The demand for caskets has hit unprecedented levels, consequently forcing an increase in price for quickly constructed wooden caskets, with the bereaved paying between N15-N20,000.

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While the burial business thrives in Omoku due to an increase in deaths of both old and young, with the massacre of entire families commonplace, the same cannot be said of other businesses. The social life of the people is completely gone as a result of the wanton killings.

Chief Chris Nwalinsor, killed with four members of his family

Although there are several checkpoints on the road to Omoku, some residents said that security has not really improved because security personnel and their checkpoints are only on one major road, the Ahoada/Omoku/Ndoni road, where policemen unfortunately exhort motorists and motorcyclists with the slogan ‘pay us our tithe’, while crimes like kidnapping, rape, theft and murder still rage unabated inside these communities.

Investigation also revealed that although the crime scene, 19, Umimegi Street, off Sambo Street, where the March 12 massacre took place, is very close to the checkpoint of the Joint Military Taskforce (JTF), the killer gang of six members maintained sporadic shooting for over an hour without any response from either the police or the soldiers.

At the moment, in many of these communities pockets of checkpoints manned by security agents, especially soldiers, abound during the day with motorcyclists alighting once at these checkpoints while passengers walk through before continuing their journeys.

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But the communities are still tense following renewed kidnapping, with no social life and evening business vanished completely. In Omoku for instance, which happens to be the commercial hub of the region, and neighbouring communities, movement of motorcycles is not allowed once it is 5pm and vehicles also become fewer on the road, with stranded commuters desperate to leave the road for fear of violence.

Once it is 6pm, streets are completely empty in the deserted city as residents lock themselves in for fear of attacks; fear well founded on experience of brutal killings, rapes and kidnappings. Some residents, particularly non-indigenes, have since sold their houses and land and left not just these communities, but Rivers state.

Mrs. Choice Richard, shot in the hand after her husband was killed

 

Many businesses in these communities have since closed up. Banks were also closed and economic activity completely paralyzed. Until recently, the United Bank for Africa (UBA)’s Omoku branch was closed after a female staff member was kidnapped and later released after payment of a ransom. The branch was only reopened last week after sustained pressure by its customers who daily thronged its gate in desperation.

Obiageli Eke, whose son was killed in one of the several attacks in Omoku, told NAIJ.com that her family and several other farming families can no longer go to their farm because the cultists have taken over a local forest since some of their leaders were declared wanted by security forces, from where they now carry out criminal activities.

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“They have taken over many farm lands. It is not only the fear of being killed that is our problem here but the fear of dying in hunger. The cultists are now across Omoku creek where they frequently kidnap farmers and fishermen. I am not only mourning my death son, but doing so in hunger. Please help us beg the federal government to come to our rescue”, she told NAIJ.com in pidgin English.

Investigations supported Mrs. Eke’s information. The cultists who are now running from justice are in the bush across the creek committing various nefarious acts, but once in a while come to the town to wreak far reaching havoc.

The crimes they commit from their hideout include forcing fishermen to fish in ponds and lakes belonging to others, with the fish caught taken by the cultists, the raping of housewives and their daughters, and kidnappings for ransoms typically of N5,000, N10,000, N15,000 and N20,000 collected from victims’ families.

Gruesome rapes happen not only in the bush but also in the town as well. A victim’s husband, who did not want his name in print for fear of stigmatization and victimization, told NAIJ.com that when his wife was raped in the night, the cultists asked him to hold the torchlight for them and compelled him to watch the act.

Another victim who was kidnapped around Oba Palace Road, Omoku, and violently gang raped and released, was able to identify one of the attackers in a public place a few days after.

A resident who witnessed the drama told NAIJ.com that when the woman saw the culprit she quickly alerted men nearby, leading to the immediate apprehension of the suspect.

The cultist reportedly denied having anything to do with the woman but she insisted, and told the men that the people who raped her had certain signs on their penises. When this was found to be true, the cultist was beaten and handed over to the police for further investigation.

One of the houses burnt by the cultists in Okposi

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The silent night

March 12, 2016, was a silent night but with much blood available to wet the ground as when Biblical Balaam offered several animals as burnt offerings on Mount Carmel.

The memories of March 12 still cause tears to cascade in Omoku community. It was a night of killings without mercy and no one to come to their aid as the cultists massacred residents of Umimegi Street, off Sambo Street, a five-minute walking distance from the JTF checkpoint. They killed and killed again with pleasure from house to house and went away unchallenged.

Choice Richard is a 24-year-old Itsekiri married woman. Her eye witness account of how her husband was killed is a chilling one. It all happened in the dark and silent night. There was no electricity to give illumination. She and her husband had heard several gunshots. It never occurred to them it was house-by-house killing and that their turn would soon arrive.

Suddenly, the attackers arrived at their house with sporadic shooting. It was now too late to escape. The men forced open the door and saw her first. They shouted: “Where is your husband”? As the husband stepped forward, he was shot in the forehead and died immediately.

Young Mrs. Richard, shivering, could not raise her head because she knew the consequences. By now, she was standing alone with her husband’s killers as they argued over whether to kill her or not. Some of them said: “Let us leave her because she is a young woman.” Others said: “No, we are not to spare anybody.”

As they argued back and forth, one of her assailants shot her almost unexpectedly in the right hand and the bullet passed through the hand, followed her rib side and came out from the back. She dropped down almost dead.

When the cultists finished the assignment, they rolled her away with their feet. Since she already appeared dead, they left her in a pool of her own blood. She was in the room alone with the corpse of her husband till the following morning when help came.

As she told NAIJ.com, she knew she was still alive, but thick darkness had taken over her life. She later awoke to find that she had been taken to the police station by her parents-in-law to obtain a permit so that doctors could treat her since it was a gunshot.

“From the first hospital I was taken to UBTH in Port Harcourt and they could not do something tangible despite the money we spent. It is local medicine that we are using now. The cultists thought I was already dead. I could not recognize any of them because it was very dark. Where am I going to start now? My life has sudden come to an end while still alive,” she said, as tears rolled down her cheeks.

Pleading with the federal government to do something drastic to end the killings of innocent Nigerians in Rivers state, Mrs Richard said Governor Nyesom Wike cannot be trusted with the security of the state. She said that the governor’s position that the state is peaceful is a deliberate lie and asked Nigerians to ignore it.

Several dead bodies were found in the creek. The cultists are said to be hiding in bush across the creek.

“Our Governor is playing politics with the lives of innocent people. There is no day people are not kidnapped, raped or killed in this place. The federal government should do something urgently about our plight here. Innocent people are dying every day here. It was three people that died in our compound that day while a total of 28 people died on that street,”  she said.

Although he lost his son, Choice’s father-in-law was still thankful to God that it was his son who died instead of his son’s wife, asking: “How could I have been able to explain to her parents that their daughter died in my house if it was the other way round?”

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During the same night and on the same street, two of the 28 people who died were a husband and wife who were nursing parents. Relatives of the husband told NAIJ.com that the couple had two female children and that the husband had longed for a male child. When the wife finally delivered a baby boy shortly before they were killed, the husband’s joy know no bounds. They were shot in the presence of the children, with the baby being a few weeks old at the time of the incident.

Royal battle over oil money

Structural injustice and massive under-development, despite its being Nigeria’s largest oil producing community, are fueling the crisis in Omoku.

Omoku is said to be responsible for over 20% of Nigeria’s total oil output with hundreds of oil wells which are being exploited by the Italian oil giant Agip.

A Rivers state government-signed document obtained by NAIJ.com shows that there are 24 government-recognized Community Development Centres (CDCs) in Omoku, but the Oba of Ogbaland, Nnam Obi Chukwumela ll, was alleged to have refused to recognize or grant autonomy to these CDCs, and instead insists Omoku is a single community under his leadership.

Some of the elders who spoke off the record contend that ancestrally Omoku has never been a single community, that certificates of autonomy for 24 communities already exist and that His Eminence’s insistence on a single palace administration was wrong and was dragging Omoku away from the path of progress.

“It is unacceptable for Omoku City to be relegated to one community. We are warning in the interest of peace and tranquility, NAOC should relate with each of the communities directly because that is the state government’s position,” one of the elders told NAIJ.com.

There have also been legal tussles over the autonomy of the 24 communities as granted by the Rivers state Ministry of Chieftaincy and Community Affairs, according a document seen by this author.

In August 2003, the chiefs and the Ezes had taken the ministry and the said communities to court; a case which the government pleaded to be settled through its in-coming caretaker at the time.

Ever since, according to information, the battle for supremacy over these communities has raged, with the Oba allegedly using his influence to split the chiefs and Ezes, and winning many of them who had earlier agitated for autonomy over to his side.

Present day Omoku. By 5pm, the place is already quiet.

There has been a series of threats from some chiefs, who are allegedly operating on the instructions of the royal father, that the leaders of various communities seeking autonomy and their backers would be seriously dealt with over their stand.

Agip Oil officials in Omoku were also accused of involvement in the crisis. Some elders told NAIJ.com that rather than deal with heads of the 24 communities directly as directed by the state Ministry of Land and Chieftaincy Affairs, the Italian company ignored the directive and continues to deal only with the Oba, whom some residents accused of not distributing equitably benefits that come from Agip Oil.

The department of Agip Oil in charge of community relations was also accused of instigating violence in order to make money, since the company will eventually release money to solve the problem whenever a crisis arises.

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Efforts to speak to Agip Oil officials in Omoku were not successful as NAIJ.com was asked to go to the head office in Port Harcourt. We visited Port Harcourt from Omoku, with officials appearing to engage in tactics designed to avoid media enquiries.

Anthony Osima, the coordinator of the Omoku Mega City Community Development Consultative Assembly (OMCDCA), made up of the controversial 24 communities, told NAIJ.com in an interview that Agip Oil’s double game with the communities is fueling the crisis because the residents are tired of living in penury amid oil wealth.

He alleged that the company is fueling royal corruption by rejecting the government’s directive to deal directly with heads of the 24 communities issued certificates of autonomy, and doling money out to the Oba who in turn shares it among his loyalists at the expense of the entire city.

“Agip Oil has connived with the Palace to impoverish our people. Rather than relate to each of the communities they say is only the Oba that they want to deal with. It pays them to do so because they spend N5 where they suppose to spend N24.

“The Oba on his own will share the N5 among his chiefs. As far as they are satisfied at the expense of the rest us they are ok. That is corruption. Dissatisfied youths are now carrying guns demanding equity and justice. There is crisis here because poverty has enveloped our people,” he said.

A visit to Oba Palace to hear the views of His Eminence, Nnam Obi Chukwumala ll, on the crisis rocking his kingdom, also did not yield any result, as the new secretary to the Palace, one Mrs. Ayanku, demanded that a letter be written stating the reasons for the interview and promised a response from His Eminence. At the time of this report, a response from the Palace had yet to arrive.

File picture: Rivers state Commissioner of Police, Mr. Musa Kimo, consoling the daughter of the late APC chieftain Franklin Obi in Omoku

Rival cult groups

Present day Omoku. By 5pm the place is already quiet.

NAIJ.com learnt that two rival cult groups exist in Omoku and have been engaging in violence since early 2014, when some members left one group for the other. The violence took on a deeper dimension when one group attempted to force members of the other group to become its members.

It was learned that a large percentage of Omoku youths are either members of one cult group or the other, a development many residents blamed on the Oba who did nothing to stop cultism when it began.

No government presence

Peace Atasia, human resources worker, said the crisis in Omoku can be divided into two: cult gang warfare and political tussles between the PDP and the APC. He laments that lives are being lost as a result.

“There were people here who claimed that their cult members were killed and there were those who claimed that their parties’ members were killed. The crisis is both political and cult affairs,” he said.

He explained that the crisis in Rivers state is a general problem in the South-South, and that from his own research, idleness among the youths is responsible for the violence because both the local, state and federal governments have no tangible plan to engage the youths in communities where violence is being unleashed.

“If you look at it from that angle, you will discover that governments at all levels have not done enough to put these youths on the right track. Go to all these communities there are no single government presence unless what the oil companies are doing. The failure of successive governments to deliberately do something to channel the youthful exuberance of these young people to something profitable is the reason they are easily lured into violence acts.  

“Take for instance; a whole local government doesn’t have single sports facility; no youths development centre, no art and craft centre, no recreational centre. When you go to our primary and secondary schools, there are no teachers teaching art subjects.

“I have not seen them organized any sporting competition. There is no standard swimming pool where our youths can be trained for global swimming competition since we are in river-line area. There should be something to attract these youths out of violence,” he said.

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He said although oil companies operating in the region are trying to contribute to their host communities by way of social responsibility, their efforts are not enough to improve the lot of the people, particularly the youths who are easily lured with bottles of beer into violence by desperate politicians.

“The oil companies here don’t do Impact Accession to evaluate whether the host communities are impacted with whatever they are doing. Yes, the youths are into violence but what are we doing to check it? What have we put in place?  he asked, almost rhetorically.

He said if the traditional leaders were doing what is required of them, the situation would be a lot different in the communities.

File picture: The Rivers re-run elections were characterised by violence

Bitter politics and the Rivers crisis

Several dead bodies were found in the creek. The cultists are said to be hiding in bush across the creek.

Sources in Omoku told this author that political gladiators of both the ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the opposition All Progressives Congress (APC), who are desperate to take control of the state’s political structure engaged cult groups to unleash violence on opponents and their followers.

According to our sources, both Governor Nyesom Wike and his arch-political rival, Rotimi Ameachi, a former governor of the state and Nigeria’s current minister of transportation, have cult groups working to expand their political domain and therefore should be called by human rights groups and the International Criminal Court of Justice to account for the loss of lives in the state.

“The term ‘one cult group after another’ should tell you that it is one political party against another. The crisis has serious political undertone. The cult groups exists before now but became more violent when politicians hijacked them.

“It is PDP against the APC; but the PDP politicians are fiercer because they are in power in the state, coupled with the fact that Rivers state is seen as PDP state. On the other hand, the APC is also using federal might. They know what they are doing; but when two elephants fights is the grass who suffers,” one source said.

The parties’ chiefs were unwilling to speak. When contacted on the telephone, Jerry Needam, media aide to the PDP chairman in the state, could not hide his disappointment as he shouted “Chief will not speak to a journalist who is not in Rivers State.”

File Photo of shootings in Rivers state.

 “It is your correspondent here who should introduce you to us,” he said and ended the call. Mr. Needam thereafter refused to take several calls and also did not reply to text messages sent to him asking his boss to clarify the role of the party in the crisis.

Chris Finebone, the Rivers state publicity secretary of the APC, did not comment when he was contacted on the phone. He said he was busy at the time of the call and that it was fine to go to press without his comments.

Ahmed Muhammad, the Rivers state police command spokesperson, told NAIJ.COM that the command is doing its best to deal with the situation and advised residents to cooperate with security personnel by providing useful information that could lead to the arrest of the perpetrators.

When asked what the command is doing to increase patrols in the communities because at the moment only one road checkpoint was found, he explained that the police cannot do more than the resources available to it permit.

“We are managing what we have to achieve what we want in Rivers state. We cannot put all our resources in Rivers state because they are equally needed in other parts of the country. I hope you understand what I mean? All I can assure the public is that we are doing our best to achieve greater peace in Rivers state”, he said.

Although there appear to be several checkpoints on the major road, NAIJ.com, however, can report authoritatively that cultists are still unleashing violence in communities in the region, except Ndoni, the home of Peter Odili, a former governor of the state.

At the time of filing in this report, news broke out of a woman who was kidnapped in Omoku and houses in a neighbouring community set ablaze.

The post Investigation: How Amaechi and Wike fuel beheadings in Rivers state appeared first on Nigeria News today & Breaking news | Read on NAIJ.COM.