By MATTHEW KALU, Umuahia

New Assistant Inspector-General (AIG) of Police in charge of Zone 9 Police formation with headquarters in Umuahia, AIG Etim Ene Okon, says he is determined to take the fight to hoodlums operating in the Zone with a view to flushing them out.

Ene, who is the immediate past Abia State Commissioner of Police, returned to Umuahia Tuesday in his new rank as AIG, assuring that he would evolve strategies that would soon end the current spate of attacks on Police stations in the Zone and make it (the Zone) “hell fire” for criminals.

He told newsmen that he was under the instruction of the Inspector-General of Police to bring to an immediate end, the orchestrated attacks, killing of policemen and burning of Police facilities in the Zone comprising Abia, Ebonyi and Imo states.

According to AIG Okon, the Zone would soon become hot for criminals as he would expand to cover the Zone, the revised crime fighting strategies he had adopted as the Commissioner of Police of Abia State which ensured peace in the state.

He however acknowledged that covering the Zone would be tough given the current security challenges of “bombings, arson and kidnapping being the order of the day,” with Policemen being killed and stations burnt.

AIG Okon while assuring that he would work closely with the Commissioners of Police in the Zone to evolve strategies to contain the situation in order to bring about the desired peace in the zone, vowed the Police would confront and flush out hoodlums in the Zone with expertise.

“We will strategically confront hoodlums. We will go back to those days when Abia was hell for the criminals. The zone is not new to me. The hoodlums in the state know what I can do,” he said. “Nigeria is our country and we cannot allow the destruction of lives and property,” he added.

The AIG, Zone 9, appealed to the public to cooperate with the Police in the Zone by volunteering credible information to enable the Police to rout the criminals, adding: “We have no other country than Nigeria. When we allow criminals to destroy the country, there will be no development.”

AIG Okon was redeployed from Abia last year to Force Headquarters, Abuja where he was put in charge of Explosives and Ordinances. On the 31st of December, 2020, he was promoted to the rank of Assistant Inspector-General of Police (AIG) and posted to Zone 12, Bauchi, before his current redeployment to Zone 9, Umuahia on April 19, 2021.