The people of Egbeda in Emohua local government area of Rivers State have issued an urgent appeal to the Inspector General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, and Governor Siminalayi Fubara to intervene and avert a breakdown of law and order after the council chairman allegedly imposed new community development and youth executives.
The plea came at a stakeholders’ meeting convened by the community’s monarch, Eze Christopher Didia, on Friday 31 October, 2025 at the community’s playground.
Attendees included Owhor title holders, chiefs, elders, women, youths and children.
In an address read on his behalf by palace secretary Chief Francis Egbe, Eze Didia insisted that the authority to appoint leaders of the Community Development Committee (CDC) and Egbeda Youth Council (EYC) has always rested with the traditional council, Nye Nwe Ali.
He accused Emohua council chairman Dr Chidi Lloyd of issuing a press release on 27 October announcing the new executives, in defiance of bodies already constituted by the traditional institution.
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“Any intervention or abrupt interruption on the functions or roles of our traditional rulership by any person or group of persons despite his/their status is usually offensive and marks the commencement of laying the foundation for crisis,” the address stated.
Eze Didia described Dr Lloyd’s action as “morally messy, politically unhealthy and offensive, culturally illicit, legally unlawful, socially unacceptable and provocative”.
He warned that the move risked undermining the “peace, security, love and togetherness” the community had enjoyed.
The chairman of Egbeda Owhor title holders, Nye-Ohna Lawrence Edi, echoed the monarch’s concerns and urged indigenes to resist being used “as stooges to cause division and destruction”.
He told Dr Lloyd to “follow the path of peace”, adding that “the will of the community supersedes all other external interest”.
