Investigate Ukwulu kidnap saga, stop fighting crime with press statements, APC tells Soludo

By Our correspondent

The Anambra State Chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has enjoined Anambra State Governor, Prof Chukwuma Soludo to investigate the kidnapping incidents that reportedly occurred in Ukwulu in the Dunukofia Local Government Area of the state last week.
Okelo Madukaife, who signed a statement on Wednesday in that respect as the State Publicity Secretary, condemned the state government’s methodology of what he described as using press statements to fight crime.

Okelo said,”The statement issued by Anambra State Government, through its Chief Press Secretary to the Governor,Mr. Christian Aburime on a core security concern set around Ukwulu, Dunukofia LG of Anambra State is hasty, preposterous and shocking; hence condemnable.

“The surprising statement which remarkably did not issue from the Commissioner for Information ( if Anambra State Government has any) dismissed the narration of claims from a couple sharing their concerns on an attack by a certain group in a particular area with a profile of such previous attacks and plastered a political underlay over it, to the effect that it is the handiwork of political detractors.

“That is not the way governments work.
If indeed the right quarters of government digested that narrative that is full of specifics, the only thing thar would have made sense at this stage is the acknowledgement of that narrative.

“The next logical cause of action as expectec by all reasonable men and women of Anambra State – and they are in yhe majority- is to activate a proper discreet investigation into the facts availed in the admittedly anonymous expose, by opening a channel to profile the author.

Continuing, Okelo said, “In 2021, an APC governorship aspirant was kidnapped in the lonely location described in the narrative and negotiated his way through family and friends after paying a princely sum.

“This matter having been properly incidented ought to be embodied in the security reports available to the governor.

“If that is the case and if anyone in the Chukwuma-Soludo Government,which monopolises the functions of 22 governments bothers to read these reports, that matter ought not to have been dismissed by a press Statement.

“It is our take that Anambra State Government should solicit and elicit all possible and available assistance from all cadre of security agencies to unearth the truth around the supposed incident.

“We remain open to the possibility of the story being real or unfounded, but the author having been profiled in the first instance would in the latter case now be made to bear the consequences of misleading government on sensitive security issues.

“It is bad enough that 25 months after a new government was ushered in in March 2022, not less than four local governments in Anambra State particularly in Ihiala-Nnewi axis are in captivity; cannot bury their dead at home or hold marriages or other ceremonies under the watch of a governor whose spokesman hastily declares his state as the safest that people want to tarnish.

“To allow Dunukofia LG, which by the way is home to Zone 13 headquarters of the Nigerian Police, covering Anambra and two other states get into tjat quagmire will be too much plague in a single four years.

“We urge the Government ofu Anambra State to arise and get its job done as we plead with all other commentators, be they traditional rulers, NGOs or other clout chasers to pull back and let the matter at hand be investigated.”