The family of Igwe Ekwueme Odenigbo, the traditional ruler of Akpakume ancient kingdom in Enugu State, has raised an alarm over the unlawful arrest and remand in prison custody of their 86-year-old blind father and his caregiver, Moses Izuchukwu, by the Nigerian Police Force on trumped-up charges.
The family averred that Odenigbo and Izuchukwu have been held in prison custody for over a week on holding charges.
The Enugu State Police Command had accused the blind monarch and his 33-year-old son, Izuchukwu of arson, promoting local war, assault on police officers on lawful duty and malicious damage of property valued at about N3 billion belonging to Mr Livinus Okolo, Henry Ugwuochi, Ozonnaya Moses Odenigbo, Ogbonna Chibueze and Okechukwu Eze.
The police, in a five-count charge, marked No. MEN/08c/2025, filed at the Enugu North Magisterial District, holding in Enugu, which our correspondent sighted on Sunday, said that their offences are punishable under sections 495(a); 416(a); 86; 259(b) and 415(b) of the Criminal Code Cap 30 Vol. II Revised Laws of Enugu State of Nigeria, 2004.
But addressing some journalists in Enugu on Sunday, Pastor Solomon Ekwueme and his sister, Roseline Ekwueme said their father and their brother did not commit any of the offences they were accused of, wondering how his aged blind father would be promoting local war in a community he had led for nearly a decade.
Calling for the intervention of the governor of Enugu State, Peter Mbah, the senator representing Enugu West at the National Assembly, Senator Osita Ngwu, the Executive Chairman of Udi Local Governor Area, Hyginus Agu and well-meaning Nigerians to come to their help, the children who came from Lagos and Anambra states, where they individually reside, unequivocally denied the allegations against their father and their brother.
They maintained that there was no way their father who is battling to live and their brother, a psychologist working with an international organisation and managing a school in the state capital, would be promoting local war in their community and committing arson.
Pastor Ekwueme, who read a written address on behalf of the family went into memory lane with several documents to back their claims, which his father had written to the police authorities, including the Inspector General of Police and so many other government agencies and offices over some lingering crisis following the report of the discovery of some mineral resources in the community, which some individuals with connection in government wanted to hijack.
He said that the refusal of their father to sign off the land was the bane of the crisis, and some individuals, led by Mr Livinus Okolo Alias Zion, had vowed to use his closeness to Governor Mbah and the Commissioner for Chieftaincy to dethrone him and install himself as the traditional ruler and appropriate the said land to himself.
They said, “It is truly heartbreaking for us to be called back to Enugu with the news that our aged and blind father, a retired elder in the Redeemed Christian Church of God and the king of an entire community has been locked up by the Nigerian Police and charged to a Magistrate Court and subsequently sent to prison at the behest of a man that has been nothing short of a terror to the entire people of Akpakwume community, Mr Livinus Okolom, Alias Zion.”