Court remands ex-Rivers LG chairman, monarch, 73 others

A High Court sitting in Port Harcourt has remanded 75 persons to the Port Harcourt Correctional Centre on alleged conspiracy in the murder of the Divisional Police Officer of Ahoada, Bako Angbashim.

The suspects, who are standing trial on two counts of conspiracy to murder and a felony in charge sheet number PHC/3208/CR/2023, were arrested after Angbashim was captured and butchered by a suspected cult group led by David Okpala, popularly called 2-baba in Odomude community, Ahoada East Local Government Area in September. this year.

Those remanded included a former Chairman of Ahoada East LGA, Cassidy Ikegbidi, Eze Ekpeye Logbo,  Ngozi Angwo and over 73 others.

The defendants, who were arraigned in court by the Commissioner of Police, did not take their plea, as the bail application by one of the defendant’s lawyers, Dejo Lamikara, was opposed by the prosecuting counsel,  Eniyepere Sikpi.

The trial judge, Justice Sika Apirioku, after listening to the argument by the lawyers, ordered that the defendants be remanded to the Port Harcourt Maximum Correctional Centre and adjourned the case till November 21, 2023, for plea and bail consideration.

Meanwhile, youths, including students in Ekpeye land have condemned the spate of violence in the area and called for an end to what they term the seeming politicisation of the killings going on there.

The Secretary-General, Ekpeye Youth Worldwide, Adokiye Oyagiri, said some youths of the area were being used to make inciting statements against the Leader of the River State House of Assembly, Edison Ehie, who represents Ahoada East Constituency II.

Oyagiri, who spoke in Port Harcourt, said, “I think it is everybody’s right to talk about insecurity but where there is an issue is when people begin to make false allegations and claims that they cannot be substantiated.

“We all know that immediately after the DPO of Ahoada East was killed, the governor placed a bounty of N100 million on the killers of the DPO, and till today we are yet to hear from the police if he has been captured or not.

“A few days ago, we had some other killings and we do not have details and we did not know when it happened until we heard the news that people had been killed.

“We reacted appropriately and we went to the press, we issued a statement condemning the killings and then we began to hear that there is a group saying they are concerned youths of Ekpeye.

“It is really sad that youths these days will avail themselves to people for unnecessary drama. Ahoada East is governed by a sitting chairman who bears the responsibility of security because he receives security votes.”