The International Society for Civil Liberties and Rule of Law (Intersociety) has revealed that the wanton destruction of lives and properties in 29 months of Imo State under Governor Hope Uzodinma has made many families in some local government areas/communities no longer ancestrally give their loved ones who died naturally or unnaturally befitting burials and funerals due to insecurity, The Sun reports.
The group alleged that natural and slain dead bodies were mostly smuggled in at nights and secretly and indecently buried, after which their funerals are held or organized outside their ancestral homes including at urban residences located in Umuahia, Owerri, Port Harcourt, Aba, Enugu, Onitsha, Nnewi etc.
The Chairman of Intersociety Mr. Emeka Umuagbalasi in a press conference at Enugu said Imo Local Government Areas mostly affected or worst hit by the “ongoing grisly and egregious destruction of defenseless lives and properties” include Orsu, Orlu, Oru East, Oru West, Mbaitoli, Ngor-Okpala, Oguta, Ohaji/Egbema, Okigwe, Ideato North, Ideato South, Owerri Municipal, Owerri North, Owerri West, Ahiazu Mbaise, Ezinifite Mbaise, Onuimo, Njaba, Isu, Nwangele and Nkwere.
“Apart from mass murders, arbitrary arrests, abductions, disappearances and civilian house burnings perpetrated by security forces and allied militias using Imo taxpayers funds, armed non state actors including Fulani jihadists, counterfeit agitators, “Government Unknown Gunmen” or political death/killer squads, private armies/militias and street violent criminals have also within the period (Jan 2021-May 2023) killed at least 700 defenseless civilians and abducted 900 others.
“No fewer than 1,500 of the arrested 3,500 unarmed citizens in Imo State in the past 29 or January 2021 to May 2023 months are still being detained in various security, defense and policing detention facilities within and outside the State.
“They include those held in Imo and Abuja DSS detention facilities and other detention facilities manned by 34 Brigade, Obinze (near Owerri) and other military formations within and outside Imo (abducted and potentially disappeared), Nigeria Police Force and its crack squads’ formations within and outside Imo State and the Ebubeagu Government militias (jointly perpetrated with Army and Police).
“Out of the detained 1,500 unarmed citizens, estimated 300 are being held under “awaiting trial” in various Correctional Centers or Prisons within and outside Imo State. The remaining 1,200 are arbitrarily held in various detention facilities manned by the above named security, defense and policing establishments including estimated 900 held within Imo and 300 others held outside the State (.i.e. FCID, FCIB, Army and DSS Headquarters, etc).
“The remaining 1,400 of the arrested 3,500 unarmed citizens are those mindlessly extorted and freed by various detaining authorities; during which each of the freed detainees coughed out not less than N300, 000 and above to regain his or her freed” Umeagbalasi said.
