– Deny Them Access To Family, Relatives
– As Community Calls For Their Release Or Arraignment
The alleged numerous atrocities perpetrated by the Tiger Base Unit of the Imo State Police Command, contrary to the laid down rules of engagement have become frightening and alarming, thereby giving credence to insinuations in several quarters that the Commander of the unit, Oladimeji, who allegedly operates as if he is above the law, “settles” and makes substantial returns to the police high command who have surprisingly kept quiet and ignored the hues and cries of Imo people whose husbands, wives, brothers, children and wards have constantly been tortured, humiliated, killed and most time kept incommunicado by operatives of the dreaded unit who have become laws unto themselves.
The several atrocious reports about the activities of the unit that has become more notorious than the disbanded Special Armed Robbery Squad SARS, include the recent arrest and detention of four youths who hail from Ezioha but were arrested at Afara, both in Mbaitoli Local Government Area on October, 26, 2024.
The youths include two brothers of the same parents, namely Chjioke Anumaka and Okechukwu Anumaka, aged 17 and 19 years respectively. Others are William Anoruo, and Onyedikachi Akpiwu.
Reports available to our news desk indicate that the youths fled from their community, Ezioha to Afara because of the constant invasion of their community by police operatives who often storm the area to arrest able bodied young men who they label as either members of IPOB or ESN in a bid to extort money from them and their families. It was gathered that, “on the fateful day, Tiger Base operatives who are said to work hand in gloves with some notorious elements in the community stormed Afara where the above mentioned four youths were staying with their relatives at about 5 am and whisked them away after shooting sporadically in different directions.
They whisked the four youths, the landlord of the house who sustained bullet wounds, his wife, a nursing mother and two children away. All these people have been in the custody of Tiger Base uptill now.
The worst part of it is that they have not allowed their relatives to see or give them food as the case may be”.
Some leaders and stakeholders in the community who commented on the development have called on the police to either grant the suspects bail or charge charge them to court as stipulated by law instead of detaining them endlessly with attendant physical, emotional and psychological torture.
