Brave Dickson
Following crime increase in Ogba/Egbema/Ndoni Local Government Area of Rivers State, the ONELGA Security Peace and Advisory Council (OSPAC) has blamed the police.
In an interview with our correspondent, the Secretary General of OSPAC, Eze Gift Ohia said the unnecessary interference into the operations of OPAC by the police is demoralizing the vigilante group.
“Notorious criminals are now all over the nooks and crannies of ONELGA because the police have not been allowing us to deal with them.
“When we catch notorious crime suspects, there are severe ways we punish them to deter them from crime.
“But the police will immediately ask us to hand over the suspects in our custody to them and the next day you will see the suspects in ONELGA communities being released on bail by the police.
Before, the police used to be afraid of patrolling in ONELGA. Policemen were afraid of putting on their uniforms. Just to tell you how deadly and dangerous, criminals had once turned ONELGA into.
“But we came in an aggressively confronted and dislodged notorious criminals from ONELGA.
“Today, the police are barring us from bearing arms when the criminals in ONELGA are operating with suphisticated weapons like AK- 47 riffle and others.
“My brother, there is no way we can confront heavily armed notorious criminals with bare hands.
“The way and manner the police are illegalizing our activities before the people of ONELGA has made us not to have financial and logistic supports from those who appreciate what we are doing.
“Just take a look! We have only one patrol vehicle that is in dire need of maintenance. How can one patrol vehicle be able to cover the entire ONELGA, he asked?”
When asked if OSPAC will voluntarily extinct should the police continue demoralizing it, Ohia said: “NO!”
“We have gone a long way. We can not extinct OSPAC because we have had a lot of enemies in course of our operations. OSPAC will continue, no matter what,” he said.
