Abuja Ohanaeze seeks dismantling of police checkpoints on S’East roads
The leadership of the Ohanaeze Nd’igbo in the Federal Capital Territory Abuja has decried extortion by men of the Nigeria Police Force on South-East roads and lamented the hardship the people of the area go through while undertaking journeys across the zone.
A statement by Ikechukwu Ani, Head, Press and Public Relations, PSC, said a delegation of the Igbo ethnic group visited the Chairman of the Police Service Commission, Dr Solomon Arase, retired Inspector General of Police in his office on Thursday where they complained of the high level extortion by policemen.
They also lamented the indiscriminate road blocks that had become unpleasant between the citizens and the police.
They called for dismantling of the fee-paying road blocks in the zone, especially with the coming heavy traffic expected during the Christmas and New Year period in the South Zone.
Arase, promised to take up the matter with the Inspector General of Police, and used the occasion to plead with the leadership of Ohanaeze to stop the incessant killings of policemen in the zone.
Arase said, “The killings of police officers in the South-East is becoming worrisome. They are killing them everyday and they should let the killers know that the police is not their enemy. They have not done anything wrong. The Force have lost quite a number of serving officers in the South-East.
“We are your friends, stop making police wives widows, they are your sisters.”
Arase noted that the problem of the South-East is that of identity crisis adding that, “we have resolved the perceived marginalisation of the zone in the police representation in the country.
The leader of the Delegation, Elder Onwu Arua, President Ohanaeze Nd’igbo FCT chapter, said the organisation was concerned about the lack of interest of the Igbos in the current ongoing recruitment exercise for constables into the Police Force.
Araua called for a more elaborate plan in police recruitment apparatus to redress the disadvantages of South-East in the Nigeria Police structure.
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