Okiro, watch Nigercem!

Mike Okiro, Nigeria’s Police Inspector-General, recently, ordered removal of guards stationed at the premises of ailing Nigerian Cement Company Plc (Nigercem), Nkalagu factory by officials of Ebonyi state Government. Okiro gave the order at a meeting of the police high command with representatives of Ebonyi government and the Nigercem’s core investor, Eastern Bulkcem Company, Port Harcourt, Rivers state. (Picture left, Governor Martin Elechi and left, IG Okiro)

Reports say Okiro's directive followed conclusion of police investigations into the crisis presently rocking the premier cement industry. Okiro had, in December of last year, ordered full scale investigation into alleged illegal occupation of the premises of the company by militia men from Ebonyi state.

The board of directors of Eastern Bulkcem Company had, sequel to the Ebonyi state’s occupation of Nigercem on July 31 last year, petitioned IG Okiro for intervention, alleging that the guards invaded premises of the cement industry and forcibly occupied the factory.

Nigercem, owned by governments of the southeast states (Ndigbo), was, following maladministration, insincerely sold off to the core investors in October 2002.

While not, of course, justifying occupation of the premises of the company by militia men allegedly procured by Chief Martin Elechi government, KlinReports hopes that Okiro’s eight months investigations were able to unearth and resolve the remote and immediate cause of the occupation.

It would be recalled that Ebonyi state government had cried out that, rather than turn the hitherto foremost cement industry around, the core investors, Eastern Bulkcem, were busy plundering the factory and looting equipment therein. Allegations, also, abound that Eastern Bulkcem had, also, violated all the agreements reached before the company was ceded to it.

And was it not when these outcries fell on deaf ears of both Eastern Bulkcem and Okiro’s police that Elechi government, possibly, resorted to self-help?

But now that Okiro has issued this order, it is well-worthwhile that he beams the searchlight of his agency on Nigercem, Nkalagu, with a view to ensuring that Eastern Bulkcem no longer falls foul of the agreements on the basis of which Nigercem was ceded to it in the first place.

Okiro should know that keeping watchful eyes on the core investor is vital to the peace process; it is more important than hasty withdrawal orders on the so-called Ebonyi militias. This is because the outcome of Eastern Bulkcem’s further violation of the take-over pact could lead to nothing but ‘Blood-bath at Nigercem’.