A civil rights advocacy group, Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), on Wednesday, slammed the Nigeria Police Force, the Nigerian Army, the Department of State Services and other security agencies for failing to protect indigenous communities in Enugu State against herdsmen invasion, despite the overwhelming and consistent logistics and financial support provided to security agencies by the Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi-led administration, in the last seven and half years.

HURIWA’s National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, in a statement, said the unrelenting attacks by marauding herdsmen on communities in Enugu, the political capital of Igboland, was an attack on the entire South-East geopolitical zone and should be treated as such by the over 60 million Igbo natives in Nigeria and Worldwide.

The group again reiterated the deployment of indigenous Igbo natives as heads of security agencies in the five states in the South-East namely Enugu, Abia, Anambra, Imo and Ebonyi. The group argued that authentic community policing is not the deployment of strangers or foreigners from the Northern/Western region to police the South-East but the posting of sons and daughter of the soil who understand the people, can identify and spot out intruders quickly and avert crimes.

Scores of people were reportedly killed in the troubled Ebor, Eha-Amufu community in the Isi-Uzo Local Government Area of Enugu on Sunday by armed herdsmen and their collaborators.

Security sources said the invaders who outnumbered the soldiers and local vigilantes, launched the attack early Sunday morning, adding that several people were killed.

Following incessant killings by suspected herdsmen in Eha-Amufu communities, Isiuzo LGA of the Enugu State, Governor Ugwuanyi convened an emergency security meeting immediately.

Recall that the last attack on Ebor and Umujiovu communities on December 8, 2022, claimed 25 lives but the Enugu State Police Command told the media that only four people were killed.

After that very attack, because it was inside Eha-Amufu town, people fled their homes. So many of them ran to neighbouring communities in Ebonyi State and some to the Enugu capital, so many have been forced into Internally Displaced Persons’ abodes.

According to reports, since January 5, 2021, till date no fewer than 120 people had been confirmed killed in four communities in Eha-Amufu by armed Fulani herdsmen and collaborators from the Agala community in Benue State.

Recently, the new Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIG) in charge of Zone 13, AIG Abutu Yaro, expressed satisfaction with the robust support the administration of Governor Ugwuanyi in Enugu gave to the Police since May 2015.

AIG Yaro also applauded Governor Ugwuanyi for the remarkable efforts of his administration in enhancing the security architecture of Enugu State through community policing mechanisms such as the formation and operation of the Neighbourhood Watch and Forest Guard, stressing that they were “very functional and effective.”

Similarly, the new General Officer Commanding (GOC), 82 Division of the Nigerian Army, Maj. Gen. Umar Musa, recently said the Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt. Gen. Farouk Yahaya, expressed profound appreciation to Governor Ugwuanyi for his immense support and cooperation with the Nigerian Army in the effective discharge of its responsibilities in the state and beyond.

HURIWA, in its statement, maintained that: “It is creditable that both the Police and the Military hierarchies have lauded Governor Ugwuanyi’s unalloyed support to security agencies. But the Army and the Police chiefs need to tell all the good people of Enugu why insecurity still persists in the state, especially kidnapping-for-ransom and invasion of villages as well as killings of Igbos by armed Fulani terrorists.

“HURIWA condemns the security agencies for their inability to avert or subdue the herdsmen who attacked the Eha-Amufu communities on Sunday. It is unthinkable why security agencies keep failing Igbos, despite the massive support in terms of logistics and financial commitment made available to them by Enugu Governor by even the admission of the Police and military bosses in the state.

“Attacks on Enugu, the regional political capital of Igbo race, is an attack on Igbos worldwide. This is why HURIWA recommends again that the deployment of indigenous Igbo heads of security agencies in Enugu and the entire South-East zone to curb the menacing trend. Igbo states’ governors need to work synergistically and in a very robust format to tackle the common insecurity that threatens the existence of Ndigbo in the map of the World. The South East states must declare security emergency and take effective, efficient and far reaching measures to crush terrorists infiltrating the South East to wreak havoc.”

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