Following unending land conflicts between his community and Umuode people, Cornelius Nomeh, monarch of Oruku community, remains a guest of many detention camps, and currently faces kidnap trial, which conviction attracts death penalty in Enugu State. Importantly, the Igwe’s ordeals are in addition to police invasion of his community in search of alleged stock-piled arms and ammunition.Wonders, they say, will never end!
The monarch of Oruku Kingdom in Nkanu East Local Government Area of Enugu state, Igwe Cornelius Nomeh, was, recently, alongside his wife and son, Ngozi and John, paraded before journalists in the state as kidnap suspects. (Pictures show remanded Igwe Nomeh and wife)
The Igwe, together with four others and members of his house-hold, was accused by the state police command of kidnapping a third year medical student of the University of Nigeria, Enugu Campus (UNEC), Miss Ifeoma Azubuike.
Ebere Amaraizu, Enugu State Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), told newsmen that the victim, Ifeoma, was kidnapped in the New Haven area of Enugu city last month, May 14, and was, eventually, rescued at the Igwe’s palace following a tip-off from some concerned members of Oruku community on May 19.
The Igwe’s son, John, a first year Psychology student of Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT), confessed to the crime by narrating that it was his cousin, Chukwunonso Anigbogu, who actually brought the female kidnap victim, Ifeoma, to be ‘remanded’ in his room for a while.
On her own part, the Igwe’s wife, Ngozi, became an accomplice in the crime because, in the logic of the police, rather than contacting her husband who was away as at the time of Ifeoma’s unlawful detention in the palace by her son and his gang, she (Lolo Ngozi), inexplicably, chose to conceal the ‘evil’ act. However, Lolo Ngozi, in an interview, denied knowledge of her child’s escapade, saying the whole thing was a set-up.
The four other paraded members of Prince John’s kidnap gang were listed as Williams Oriaku, Friday Ezeh, Ugochukwu Amadi and kenechukwu Ossai. Amaraizu (PPRO) disclosed that the suspected kidnappers would, soon, be charged to court for the offence.
Insider Weekly gathered that the suspects had lured Ifeoma, an indigene of Nnewi in Anambra state, into a Toyota Camry car in the New Haven area of Enugu metropolis on the fateful day and sped off. The bemused kidnap victim, Ifeoma, recollected that the hoodlums blind-folded her, tying her up with a cloth, as a result of which she could not recognize the face of any of them. Ifeoma added that while she was still incarcerated, she always overheard five different voices of members of the gang while they were holding their meetings. Ifeoma was, however, silent on whether the hoodlums sexually exploited her throughout her hostage period or not.
Ifeoma, said to have a rich family background, was, ostensibly, kidnapped for ransom purposes by the miscreants. Ifeoma’s father is reported to be an affluent Lagos based businessman.
The suspects, the police claimed, initially demanded a ransom of N100, 000,000.00 (One Hundred Million Naira only), from their victim’s father, but were to later review it downwards, thinking that the business mogul would, eventually, ‘play ball’. But the Azubuikes did not before police operatives swooped on them on the fifth day, and rescued the ill-fated victim, Ifeoma.
Notwithstanding the fact that Ifeoma was rescued in his palace, Igwe Nomeh, vehemently, denied involvement in her alleged kidnap. Igwe Nomeh who averred that he was staying in his Enugu residence at the period in question, seemed of the opinion that his son, John, in whose room the alleged kidnapped Ifeoma was locked up ought to be held responsible, and not him and his wife. The Igwe’s response might have derived from a constitutional provision which stipulates that, at age 18 and above, a citizen takes responsibility for his actions and in-actions.
’I am innocent and should be treated with reverence. There is no reason I, as Igwe of my people, should be given this kind of degrading treatment, parading me about, and messing me up like a common criminal. John is, quite alright, my son, but he can be anybody else’s son; let him answer for himself’, Igwe Nomeh blurted, as his eyes got covered with tears.
For the well-fed looking, but troubled monarch, it has really been ‘One Week, One Trouble’, especially, with the unending conflicts between his Oruku and their sister Umuode community. The conflicts which revolve round the ownership of Agu-Efi land, an attractive massive expanse of land in the area, have defied several years of intervention by past and present governments of Enugu state. The crisis dates back to 1995.
Remarkably, the Igwe was still fresh from Enugu prison custody where he and 14 of his subjects were remanded since April 6 this year over a renewed hostility that broke out on April 2 between them and the Umuodes when the latest trouble (alleged involvement in kidnap) came upon him.
Igwe Nomeh was, exclusively, granted bail on health grounds on April 21, that is, after almost three weeks in prison remand. And among the prominent Orukus still languishing in custody over the April 2 conflict involving Agu-Efi land is Chief Theophilus Okechukwu Adeyi, the community’s Town Union President-General.
Although eleven out of the incarcerated Orukus were, penultimate week, released on bail by an Agbani High Court, Adeyi and a few others still remain in prison custody for reasons that, rather, look foggy. The magazine learnt that Adeyi has, twice, fallen sick in prison, a situation which seriously threatens his life, but the appropriate court sees no reason in releasing him on bail. Especially, as the offence(s) for which Adeyi remains incarcerated in a bailable one.
Igwe Nomeh, apart from alleged involvement in the current kidnap saga, also, has a case of assassination of two boys from the rival Umuode community hanging on his neck like the sword of Damocles. An Enugu Magistrate Court had ordered the remand of the Igwe and his co-accused subjects on charges of conspiracy to commit murder, malicious damage, arson and promoting native war among others.
Although Igwe Nomeh and his Oruku people have continued to shout themselves hoarse over what they describe as the partisan role of Police Inspector-General, Ogbonna Onovo, and Enugu state government in the quarrel between them and the Umuodes, there does not seem to be any light at the end of the tunnel for them, at least, for now. The Orukus have always stridently accused IGP Onovo who is, incidentally, of the Umuode stock of supporting his kinsmen in their perennial conflicts with them.
The latest crisis that led to the hauling of tens of the Orukus, including Igwe Nomeh, Adeyi and ‘some consecrated men of God’, into prison custody was as a result of alleged plans by the Umuodes to erect structures, such as schools and markets in the disputed Agu-Efi land in spite of several pending court suits concerning ownership of the land.
Among the suits in which the internecine Oruku, Umuode conflicts have formed a subject matter include: HAGB/6/08 – suit against acquisition of Agu-Efi land by Government of Enugu State; E/271/09- suit against government white paper on Oruku/Umuode Crisis and E/84/2010 – suit against government and Umuodes on the legality (or otherwise) of Umuode autonomous community among others.
This crisis seemingly reached a crescendo with the publication of a white paper by the government of Barrister Sullivan Iheanacho Chime on the report of a committee it set up to inquire into impasse. In the main, the white paper directed the more populous and dominant Orukus to vacate the disputed Agu-Efi land for their minority Umuodes.
The Orukus, understandably, swiftly, opposed the white paper, accusing the committee of tilting its report in favor of the Umuodes. Thus the Orukus dared Chime government, saying the implementation of such a white would be over their dead bodies.
And recently, the people raised an alarm over a police station which, they claimed, is being surreptitiously citing on the disputed Agu-Efi land. The Oruku people, presently, allege moves by IG Ogbonna Onovo and Enugu state command to set up a Police Station in the hotly disputed Aguefi land.
In a statement, signed by Chiefs Nnamani Nworji and Uwakwe Ani (for the elders) and Mrs. Amaka Igwe and Veronica Nnamani (for Oruku
women), the Orukus maintained that Onovo’s action is aimed at forcefully implementing part of the Enugu State Government White Paper on
Oruku, Umuode crisis despite the pending cases against it.
Contended the Orukus: ‘We wish to state that the establishment of a police station is among the recommendations of Barrister C.J Aneke-led panel on Enumeration of
Houses in Oruku/Umuode.
‘It is one of the subject matters in our numerous suits. We strongly condemn the plan to establish a police station at the disputed Aguefi land because such will be prejudicial to our pending court cases against the government s white paper’.
The statement added that Oruku people had never requested for the establishment of a police station in their community before now, adding that it is, therefore, ‘very
unfortunate that Mr Ogbonna Onovo (IG), who hails from Umuode stock in our neighboring Akpugo community, has been assisting the Umuode of
Oruku to forcefully implement the said white paper in spite of pending court cases on the matter in order to avenge the outcome of the war
fought by Oruku and Akpugo in the 1970s incited by the Umuode stock of
Akpugo.’
Oruku, equally, raised an alarm that IGP Onovo, in order to emasculate Oruku
people in his current plan with Professor Barth Nnaji (a prominent
Umuode man), recently, deployed hundreds of mobile policemen to all
nooks and crannies of Oruku community’, even in areas outside the disputed Aguefi Land of Oruku community.
‘By this move, IGP Ogbonna Onovo has thereby restricted the movement
of our people (and even strangers) in and out of oruku community.
‘It is a type of forced imprisonment on the entire law abiding citizens of the community. It is on record that IGP Ogbonna Onovo and his cohorts
could not establish a police station in his own community of Akpugo in Nkanu West Local Government Area of Enugu State, a large community than ours’.
Since Akpugo community, despite her vastness, still report to the
Police Station in Agbani town in Nkanu West council area, the Orukus say they are at a loss why the Inspector-General of Police is trying to set up
a police station in Oruku/Umuode.
The people remonstrate that a more appropriate place to site such a Police Station, if need be, is ‘Idodo Court’, to which both the Orukus and Umuodes belong rather than the disputed Aguefi Land.
‘We have instructed our team of Lawyers to take appropriate legal action against this clandestine move aimed at implementing the government white paper through the back door. We, therefore, request the Presidency and Enugu State Government to prevail on IGP Onovo and Enugu State Command to stop forthwith, any action which will further escalate the present Oruku/Umuode conflict’, pleaded the Oruku statement.
For now, Igwe Nomeh is back to detention, waiting to undergo trial for alleged kidnap among other crimes the natural ruler would have, also, been fingered in. Instructively, kidnap is tagged a capital offence in Enugu state, and the implication of this is that anybody, no matter how highly placed, found guilty of the crime, will be sentenced to death, as passed into law by the state House of Assembly.
In another sordid development, in the early hours of Tuesday, June 1, a battery of policemen stormed Oruku community, and ransacked the homes of two of her prominent indigenes namely: Gabriel Nwatu and Nwatu Nnamani.
Scores of the police operatives, according Elders Gabriel and Nwatu, bumped into them and members of their house-hold early that morning in search of what, it was learnt, were stock-piled ammunition. The police were said to have been tipped off by some informants from the rival camp to the effect that the Orukus have been stock-piling arms and ammunition in the homes of some of its prominent men.
Incidentally, the operatives, after several hours of combing the rooms and the entire compounds of the two men, declared that they saw neither the sought after arms nor ammunition as alleged by the informants.
Will Igwe Nomeh really come clean of this kidnap allegation? Or will he get convicted and sent straight to the hangman’s noose? Or still, were Igwe Nomeh and members of his family being set up because he has been fighting his people’s cause?
Further, now that the owners of the two invaded homes were found not to have stock-piled the alleged arms and ammunition, would police authorities let go of their fake informants? Or, would they try to bring them to book for giving false information which has led to contravening of the citizens freedom from molestation and inhuman treatment of any sort?
The answers to these posers lie in the womb of time.
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