Last week, Department of State Services (DSS) officials said that five Fulani herdsmen Mohammed Gainako, Ibrahim Mohammed, Idris Yakubu, and Isa Mohammed Rago were killed and buried in shallow graves in Umuanyi Forest near Aba in Abia State. According to the DSS, the five men were among 55 people who had been secretly killed extra-judiciously and buried in the forest.
Several Igbo organisations have come out to deny that the men were murdered by political activists and Governor Okorocha appears to be reinforcing this point, adding that it was probably just the work of common criminals. During his meeting with the Hausa community leaders at Government Hose Owerri, Governor Okorocha reassured them of their safety while appealing to them to remain calm and peaceful.
At the meeting were family members of the dead Fulani herdsmen, who were delighted when the governor told them that two of those who masterminded the killings had been arrested. He assured them that they would be made to face the full wrath of the law in due course.
Governor Okorocha said: “Those who carried out the killings did not target the Fulani men only as they also killed two Igbo men whose corpses were also exhumed with the bodies of the Fulanis. Criminals carried out the killings and those arrested will be treated as criminals.
“You should not see the incident as a targeted attack on the Fulanis because evidence from the exhumed bodies indicates that two Igbos were in the number of the exhumed bodies. Two of the culprits have been apprehended and will be made to face the consequences of their action."
Earlier this week, the Indigenous people of Biafra, the Igbo Youths Movement and the Igbo Women Association all denied the claim that it was an ethnic attack on Hausa-Fulanis. They added that the claims were part of a ploy by the federal government to engineer another round of mass killing of Igbo in northern Nigeria.
Comments
Post a Comment