The Taraba State Police Command says it has arrested two persons who were trying to dump two dead bodies in their possession around Kwambai/Jenuwa villages in Takum Local Government Area.

Speaking in a telephone interview, the Taraba State Police Public Relations Officer, DSP. David Misal, told Channels Television that the Commissioner of Police has ordered that the two persons arrested alongside the Toyota Hilux van they used to convey the corpses be brought to Jalingo for investigation.

He said though details of the act are sketchy the suspects are being transferred to the Police Headquarters in Jalingo to unravel the rationale behind their possession of dead bodies.

On his part, the Chairman of Takum local government area, Mr. Shiban Tikari in a telephone interview said the two dead persons are armed robbers shot down by local vigilante group who were on patrol last night and the Toyota Hilux van was donated to the vigilante group personnel who are helping in securing the area against kidnapping, armed robbery, herdsmen attack among other negative vices.

Accordingly, he revealed that, after engaging the armed robbers in a shootout, the vigilante discovered that they had succeeded in killing two of them, they then had to put them behind the vehicle and conveyed them to the divisional police outpost in Takum, but were stopped at a checkpoint by the Nigerian Army who interrogated them and asked them to take the corpse to the police divisional office in Takum.

He said early this morning a crowd of people gathered at the divisional police outpost Takum, pelting stones at the office demanding to see the corpse and know if it were their people, on discovering that they are not, they dispersed.

He advised the divisional police officer of the council to move the vigilante officers and the corpse to Jalingo, in order to douse the tension already generated.

Mr Tikari pointed out that the narratives on social media are totally different and surprising.

He said that Takum is one of the five local government areas in southern Taraba faced with kidnapping, armed robbery in recent times, a situation which he said has led to several meetings between the Governors of Taraba and Benue, with a view to nipping the situation in the bud. (Channels TV)

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