As Gunmen Intensify Attacks on Policemen in Anambra State

Quite recently, gunmen suspected to be separatists have intensified attacks on policemen in Anambra State. David-Chyddy Eleke reports that not less than three have happened in quick succession, begging the question whether policemen have become endangered species in the state

In Anambra State, gunmen masquerading as secessionists have marked security operatives for attacks. This can only account for several attacks on police operatives, leading to casualties on the part of the police force, and in some cases on the part of the gunmen too. Police operatives have also paid the supreme prices for such attacks, while in some others, the gunmen lose men.

Three recent attacks have unsettled police operatives in the state. The most recent was the attack on Oba police station in Idemili North Local Government Area. The attack happened on Tuesday, September 3.

Police public relations officer for Anambra State Police command, SP Tochukwu Ikenga who revealed the attack said the suspected armed secessionist group started shooting sporadically in an attempt to gain entrance to the Police Station in the morning attack, and threw petrol bombs at the security facility which made some of the offices go up in flames, including the Oba Civic Center.

Ikenga said: “Unfortunately, a police corporal who was fatally wounded paid the supreme price, while the fire was put off with the help of other Police officers on duty and the Joint Security responding team.” He said the Police-led Joint Security Force comprising of the Army, Navy, Civil defence and other security agencies were in a joint onslaught operation within Oba and its environs as at the time of the press release.

Also, on the very last day of August, just four days before the Oba attack, Ogbaru Local Government Secretariat which is not too far from Ogbaru police station was also attacked. It would not be the first time Ogbaru Local Government secretariat is being attacked.

SP Tochukwu Ikenga who reacted to the development said the security operatives gallantly resisted the gunmen, but some properties of the local government including cars and buildings were destroyed. He said no life was lost in the attack.

Some other older attacks on police men in the state within August include one in Nnewi and another in Nnobi, Idemili South Local Government Area, where policemen paid the supreme prices during the attacks. In the Nnewi attack, gunmen attacked a police van, killing one of the policemen at a junction.

Sources said the incident happened at about 9am on a Friday, and that the attackers when repelled by the policemen, but the gunmen threw an improvised explosive device at the police team, which ripped one of them.

In the Nnobi attack, it was gathered that it happened at a checkpoint beside the Nnobi Police Headquarters. Sources said the gunmen engaged the policemen in a gun duel that lasted for about an hour, during which one of the policemen, simply identified as Nwaibi, was fatally injured.

The deceased police officer was said to be the driver of one of the police vehicles. The sources said the hoodlums lodged in a house close to the checkpoint, at the compound of a woman identified as Mama Amanda. They were said to have broken a wall through which they entered the compound and forced the residents to open the gate to drive in their cars.

They were also said to have collected the handsets belonging to the residents and forced them into a room and warned them not to raise the alarm failing which they would be shot. The report also quoted eyewitness accounts as explaining that the hoodlums captured a young man said to be going on an errand that Friday morning, adding that the hoodlums had in their possession objects said to be snipers, AKs, lunchers, chains.

In both accounts, the police command headquarters in Anambra confirmed the development. The state police command’s spokesperson, SP Tochukwu Ikenga while reacting to the first attack on Nnewi said: “The men were attacked at a checkpoint at Omata junction, in Uruagu community, along the Nnewi Oba road.

“Manhunt operation has commenced, and it is led by Assistant Commissioner in charge of Nnewi Area Command. The command is already working with the locals in the area to unmask and apprehend the attackers.” On his reaction in the second attack, Ikenga who confirmed the second attack said: “It is true. One policeman was killed, and there is an operation going on in that area now, which the Commissioner of Police has ordered,” he said.

While many believe that the attacks are carried out by the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), the secessionists group has washed its hands off the attacks. In a press release by its spokesperson, Emma Powerful, he stated that it established the Eastern Security Network (ESN) as an armed Vigilante group to dislodge the Fulani terrorists masquerading as herdsmen in Biafra Land not to confront the Nigerian Security Forces or otherwise.

Powerful in the release alleged that: “They are responsible for the mass abductions and rape of women in Nigeria. They are behind the kidnapping for ransom and human organ trafficking in Biafra Land and in Nigeria with murderous fulani security agents in Nigeria.

“Unfortunately, the Nigerian government and her Security Forces tacitly supported the atrocities of the Fulani terrorists by refusing to arrest and prosecute these Fulani mass murderers, rapists and kidnappers.

“In order to defend the defenseless Biafrans, the IPOB Leader Mazi Nnamdi Kanu in collaboration with IPOB family worldwide established the Eastern Security Network (ESN) in December 2020 as a child of necessity to checkmate the activities of Fulani terrorists nicknamed herdsmen in Biafraland.

“The mandate given to ESN operatives was to curtail, dislodge, and remove terrorists maiming and destroying Biafran farms and farmers. The ESN operatives have never deviated from their mandate of protecting Biafra bushes, forests, and people.

“On the other hand, IPOB as a movement remains non-violent and peaceful in all our activities since the formation of IPOB. Any day, IPOB decides to move into armed struggle, the world will know, and the Nigerian government will know as well

“ESN Operatives are not after the Nigerian Security Forces. We know that the Nigerian government sponsor and use criminal elements and members of their security agencies to commit criminal actions in Biafraland for the purposes of blackmailing IPOB in the global arena just like they did in the Owerri jail break and the most recent being the killing of mainly Igbo military personnel in Aba claiming that IPOB was responsible.

“But we know that the objective of the murder of those soldiers on the most revered day in Biafran calendar was to present IPOB in bad light in eyes of our people and the world as well as to destabilise the developmental work being carried out in Abia State by the governor of the state.

“The Nigerian government knows those who take responsibility for crimes committed in Biafraland, and those people are neither IPOB nor ESN, why does the Nigerian government ignore them and accuse ESN and IPOB of what they had no knowledge about?

“The answer is very simple because it accentuates their strategy which is to attribute every criminal act in Biafraland to the only genuine movement standing between them and their evil agenda to conquer our people and dispossess us of our ancestral land and heritage.”

Meanwhile, the Commissioner of Police, CP Nnaghe Obono Itam has condemned the attacks on police operatives. A press release by the state Command’s spokesperson, Ikenga, he quoted the commissioner as describing the act as invasion of security facilities. He said the hostilities towards security agents was an attack on the soul of the nation and vowed to bring those behind the unholy act to book.

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