SLAVE WAR: COMMUNITY CRIES OUT TO UGWUANYI FOR PROTECTION

The people of Ugbene in Alor-Uno, Nsukka Local Government Area of Enugu State have lamented over what they described as “man’s inhumanity to man” in the area and appealed to Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi to protect them from their neighbours, the people of Ejuona. They said that the people of Ejuona had been treating them as slaves because they had more access to political positions than them and asked Ugwuanyi to rescue them from the situation which they had inadvertently found themselves.

Addressing a news conference in Enugu, weekend, the people gave an example of how an Ugbene man who passed through a track road preserved for those said to be non-slaves was beaten to a state of stupor by Ejuona youths who later invited a female student of a tertiary institution to urinate on him as a sign of conquest over Ugbene people.

The Chairman of Ohanaeze Ugbene Leaders of Thought, Nelson Ogbonna who spoke, told newsmen that Ejuona youths had unleashed mayhem against their youths, after branding them as “settlers.” Ogbonna, further said that although Governor Ugwuanyi had ordered truce by asking the belligerents to maintain peace as his government had concluded plans to set up an administrative panel of enquiry into the matter, some policemen, accompanied by Ejuona people came from the state police headquarters to arrest Ugbene people based on trumped up charges of arson, robbery and attempted murder and have since been detained without giving them access to their lawyers or relations.

He said that those detained were arrested on Monday, which was same day of the peace meeting between the governor and both the Ejuona and Ugbene people at Government House in Enugu. His words, “as I speak, six of those people are still in detention five days after their arrest. Two of them were released because of their age and health conditions. “We are calling on the governor to intervene again. We did not know that when we were meeting with him, policemen were arresting our people from their homes. “We are peace-loving people and we will not like this violence to escalate. The people of Ejuona want to decimate our people because they don’t want to see any meaningful person rise from our place.”

Ogbonna further accused the people of Ejuona of striving to decimate the Ugbene people through spontaneous but unprovoked attacks reportedly sponsored by a member of the state House of Assembly and a traditional ruler among other leaders adding that many Ugbene people had been violently attacked for passing through a major track road designated by Ejuona people for themselves who were now regarded as “the indigenes.”

According to him, the alleged sponsors of the attacks against Ugbene people were responsible for had bought over the Police who were now arresting and detaining Ugbene people indiscriminately. Officers at the Nsukka Police Area Command declined comments on the matter saying that the state Department of State Security, DSS, had taken over the matter from the Police.