The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Ekpan

  • Breaking: Aide to gov Okowa shot dead in Delta

    A Special Adviser to Delta state Governor, Ifeanyi Okowa identified simply as Ngozi Ijei was shot dead in Ekpan, Uvwie local government area of the state last night.

    The killing of Ngozi, who was a key player in the political unrest in the area since the last decade, has led to fear and tension in the area.

    It was gathered that youths were mobilizing as at the time of this report to attack perceived enemies of the deceased and burn down their properties.

    Prior to his appointment by Okowa in 2016, Ngozi was standing trial for sundry crimes, including murder, but was controversially released from prison before being appointed SA on Community and Youth Affairs to the governor.

    His murder last night was the latest in a bloody chapter which has seen a spike in insecurity in Ekpan and Jakpa Road areas of Uvwie LGA.

    It would be recalled that at least six persons were killed in the area in the last couple of weeks in the latest upsurge of violence before the botched February 16 general elections.

    Uvwie is usually a hotbed of crisis since 2003, because of the usual contending political forces and interests of key players in the Urhobo community.

    The current Delta South Senatorial candidate of the PDP and incumbent House of Representative member in Uvwie/Sapele/Okpe Federal Constituency, Ms Evelyn Oboro, hails from the area.

    Oboro is locked in a supremacy tussle with deposed chairman of the council, Mr. Henry Baro, who is the APC flag-bearer aiming to succeed Oboro in the lower chamber of the National Assembly.

    The governorship candidate of the APC, Mr. Great Ogboru, has a strong fellowship in the area, and in his 2003 failed contest with then-incumbent James Ibori, dozens of houses were burnt in Uvwie by supporters of the PDP and Ogbodu’s then Alliance Democracy.

  • Arsonists’ raze Ekpan traditional head’s palace

    Arsonists’ raze Ekpan traditional head’s palace

    The protracted crisis rocking Ekpan Community in Uvwie Local Government area of Delta State assumed a dangerous twist on Thursday morning when the palace of the embattled Unuevworo (traditional head), Chief Newton Agbofodoh, was set ablaze by yet unidentified arsonists.

    The Unuevworo is in detention following his arrest about a month ago for sundry crimes, which his associates wave off as vendetta and political power play aimed at securing the council for the ruling PDP in the 2019 election.

    His palatial home adjoining the palace in Ekpan, which is just hundreds of meters from the Ekpan Police Station, was set ablaze at about 1am by armed youths who seized the building.

    His family members alleged that the assailants prevented neighbours from putting out the fire, adding that the police failed to stop the attack, even though the scene was a shouting distance from the station.

    His son, Mr Darlington Newton Agbofodoh, in an exclusive telephone chat with our reporter, said the attack on the palace was led by an aide to Governor Okowa (names withheld) and other members of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) in the council.

    Delta Command Police Public Relations Officer, Celestina Kalu, who confirmed the fire incident, said the matter was being investigated, adding that it was too early to say if it was arson or accident.

    “I got the report about fire incident at Ekpan, but the matter is being investigated at this time.”

    Nevertheless, the victim’s son (Darlington), insisted that the attack was carried out by his father’s foes in connivance with security operatives.

    He said, “Some people called around 1am that some people are surrounding my father’s house. Someone (who) was inside the house called to tell us.”

    He said that the eyewitness, identified as Mr Wilson Amaju, reported the matter at the state.

    While denouncing the act as purely political, he alleged that the masterminds had threatened to burn the house shortly after the arrest of his father; he said he didn’t expect the police to arrest anybody.

    “After they arrested my dad, a week later they (masterminds) went to the house to pack the property inside the house.  They scattered the property. When they were doing that they said they would come back and burn down the house that they are not through with him.

    “Finally they went there last night and burn the house. We know the people that burnt the house. They are the ones that laid allegations against him that made them to arrest him. They are connected to the Delta state government.

    “The police in Delta state are not doing their job; they are being paid not to arrest these persons. There have been a lot of things (happening) in this community and they (police) have not done anything about any.

    “We are tired because we are being oppressed for no just reason and nobody is doing anything. We may be forced to cry to the Federal Government. They are beating people, mothers and children. They are raping women and girls and yet there seems to be nothing from the police and no action from government,” Darlington lamented in an emotion-laden voice.

    Chief Agbofodoh prior to his arrest had being having a running battle with the State Government official over the running of the local government council over the deposition of the elected chairman of the council, Chief Henry Baro.

    Baro his Agbofodoh’s cousin.

    Meanwhile, the attack and razing of the palace on Thursday have raised fresh concern about peace and security in the area; residents who spoke with our reporter expressed fears of more attacks.

    “This is a vicious circle; some persons who are close to the government are today using their powers and ‘immunity’ to attack the other, just like some have done in the past. Tomorrow, we do not know what is going to happen.

    “Now people sleep with one eye open because there is bound to be some form of reprisal attacks,” the source, who asked not to be named, said.

  • The odds as ‘shepherd’ of Ekpan is struck

    The odds as ‘shepherd’ of Ekpan is struck

    The traditional head of Ekpan (Unuevworo) community, Uvwie council area of Delta State, Chief Newton Agbofodoh, was recently taken out of sight by security operatives in a rather unusual operation, which some community folks initially mistook to be a kidnap operation. Bolaji Ogundele, in this piece, writes about the operation and some emerging perceptions over the development

    The community is something of a reference when it comes to discussing the hard outlook of those from the Warri axis of Delta State. As a matter of fact, it is one of the communities of Uvwie Kingdom. Ekpan has its unusual way of doing things, especially when it comes to raising hell and street fighting. Whenever Ekpan is boiling, all commuters avoid the route and residents, especially the none indigenous ones, get wary of returning home.

    The community has seen a lot of bloody clashes and resistances, so much that sounds of gunshots do not come as scares anymore for even the young ones. Residents have been witnesses to daylight robberies and even bold kidnaps, so much that such sights are definitely not strange or what scares anybody anymore. The Ekpan neighbourhood is about the community that keeps the men and officers of both the 3 Battalion, Effunrun Barracks and the Warri Area Command of the Delta State Command most busy.

    But this community may have seen  a lot of blood and bruises, it seems it had never been bloodied and battered as it did last week Friday; June 17. The traditional head (Unuevworo) of Ekpan community, Chief Newton Agbofodoh, one of the most powerful traditional office holders in Uvwie, was reportedly brutalised and treated with something that would naturally be reserved for a common criminal, as they say. Going by the initial alert of those who saw the scene, the entire Warri metropolis was made to believe that the ‘Unuevworo’ had been kidnapped in daylight glare.

    “I don’t think this community will sleep tonight o, if you see how these militants handled chief, you yourself will be afraid. Some were dressed in military camouflage and others in regular muftis; they were merciless, beating the man as if he had stolen something. I even learnt that it was because one of them hit his head with the butt of the gun that broke his head and bathed him with so much blood. There is so much tension in my area now, I’m contemplating going to stay with my cousin around PTI for the time being, at least till the tension calms down, or till they manage to get the man out of kidnappers’ den”, Tony, a resident of the area, had narrated how he saw the development that Friday.

    The usual Ekpan community unrest/retaliation had been anticipated, probably another scene of curfew-like environment, with soldiers and policemen doing the rounds, to minimise the bloody after-effect of such an unusual ‘heist’ on the community. However, the situation was rather calm and further calmed the next day by an acknowledgement situation report from the state’s police command, which identified and acknowledged responsibility for the horrific scene that accompanied the disappearance of the Unuevworo.

    The spokesperson of the Delta State Police Command, Superintendent of Police (SP), Celestina Kalu, said the operation that involved Chief Agbofodoh was, as a matter of fact, not a kidnap, but an arrest. The arrest of a ‘long wanted suspect’.

    According to Kalu, Chief Agbofodoh has been on the radar for a while, being sought to answer to crimes ranging from murder to kidnapping and robbery.

    Her message at least indicated that the chief was not kidnapped. It also confirmed where to look at to find the community leader.

    “Today, being 17/5/16, at about 1520hrs, one Chief Newton Agbofodoh was arrested at Ekpan in Warri by a team of Anti-kidnapping Operations (ACPOL), Warri, led by Inspector James Daniel, in connection to the following crimes; murder of John Mugidi on 16/5/16, murder of Joseph Utuedor on 27/5/16, murder of Edigbe Ikpesa sometimes in October 2012. The Delta Mall robbery/wanton vandalism and destruction in January 2016. Suspect is linked to series of killings within Ekpan community. Effort is being intensified to arrest his cohorts”, the situation report said.

    However, a witness to the arrest of Agbofodoh, Hon. Blessing Oghori, said the action was an organised blackmail by a community faction and politicians opposed to his communal headship, to give him a bad name and to punish him for crimes he knows nothing about.

    “What is happening now is unhealthy for peace and security in Ekpan. The community under the authority of the Unuevworo has been very peaceful for sometime now. Everybody is going about his normal business. It is shocking that without an arrest or search warrant, the police and army, with internal collaborators, can invade the home of such a personality, brutalise and take him out like a common criminal”, Oghori said.

    Narrating the incident, Oghori said, “At about 2.45pm Friday, men of the Nigerian Army and mobile policemen stormed his compound in the Delta State’s Waterways and Land Security Committee vans to take him away. There was no warrant of arrest but he didn’t argue with them. The troop of army and mobile policemen, numbering over a hundred, were guided by community informants opposed to Chief Agbofodoh. The informants, I can identify very well, were wearing camouflage and bearing guns too. Immediately the army held Chief Agbofodoh, the community informants attacked and broke his head with a gun. They then dragged him naked inside a vehicle and took him to the Warri Area Command. The man was really messed up in the presence of the police who did nothing about it”, Oghori said.

    However, to some observer conversant with Delta State politics, all the the hoolaballoo about Agbofodoh’s arrest and and the high sounding crimes that the police have recorded against his name, whether real or cooked up, may just be meant to keep the man out of circulation for the time being. To such observers, considering the local politics of Uvwie council area and the Ekpan community relations with the companies it is hosting, it may be his adversaries from the community, who are well seated in the state’s corridors of power , that are pulling the strings, working to get him out of the way to enable them maximise their time and the ‘men of today’.

    As an observer, Kenneth Ogaga, a Warri based political analyst puts it, “His travail may as well not go beyond 2019, that is if he and his faction in Uvwie will be able to bargain with the opposition ahead of the elections. It’s a well-worn game in Delta State; those they are now using against him were also in jail before the administration came in, threw away all the legal fireworks built against them and brought them out of jail to head departments in government. So, don’t be surprised when you hear one hot afternoon that Chief Newton Agbofodoh has been made an S.A to Governor Ogboru; from prison to palace. That’s how we roll here”.

  • Group cautions against fresh violence in Ekpan

    As part of efforts to find a lasting solution to the crisis in Ekpan community  in Uvwie  Local Government Area of Delta State, a group, Ekpan Integrity Group (EIG), has cautioned against fresh outbreak of violence in the community.

    The group stressed the need for  stakeholders in Ekpan and Uvwie to ensure that those responsible for fanning the embers of crisis face the law.

    EIG President Pastor Innocent Akpotedja-Adjenughure, a lawyer, spoke during the inauguration of the group in Ekpan at the weekend. He decried the loss of lives and properties during crisis, which he said, has led to Ekpan almost becoming a ‘ghost land’ and led to investors leaving in droves.

    He said: “We can’t allow fear, intimidation,  to keep us silent when evil  is going on. We cannot be here and see the rate of arms proliferation, see the rate of crisis, conflicts, violence go on in Ekpan community and keep silent. We cannot fold our arms and see things crumble in our own time and  generation.”

    Akpotedja-Adjenughure was accompanied by Vice President – Terry Moses Aruroje;  Secretary- Ifie Prince;  PRO- Pere Judah, Publicity Secretary and Orumeji Kingsley- Mobiliser.

    The group made up of  Ekpan indigenes of like minds, he said,was borne out of the desire to bring about  peace, sustainable development and  sustainable security in Ekpan. He added that they would work with law enforcement agencies  and relevant stakeholders as  well as government to restore peace , sanity, pride and dignity of  the community. He said the era when  evil perpetrators were allowed to go unpunished had passed.

    Pastor Innocent said: “Any human being that takes  the life of any member of Ekpan community must pay dearly  for it. I can assure you that, we would mobilise resources, mobilise whatever it takes against any one that takes up arms against  any one in this community. ..It is a passion for all of us.

    “When good men keep silent when evil is going on, they become part of the evil, so, good men will not keep quiet, they  will talk out .”

    The Secretary of the group, Comrade Ifie Prince,  said the group would collaborate with government and other stakeholders to  solve the problem of incessant crisis in the community.

    The leader of the legislative arm of Uvwie Local Government  , Hon. Glory Utuedor and th Divisional Police Officer (DPO) of Ekpan Police  Station, Chris Sogara, who was represented by DSP Monday Eghujovwo, promised to collaborate with the group to bring lasting peace to Ekpan.

    Some indigenes of Ekpan community, including Olorogun   Daniel Igedo,  Hon.Eyimofe  Akemu and Comrade Harry Odafe pledged their loyalty to the group.

  • Chevron inaugurates women facility for Ekpan community in Delta

    As part of its corporate social responsibility to its host communities, the management of Chevron Nigeria Limited, CNL, operators of the NNPC/Chevron Joint Ventures, last weekend inaugurated the Ekpan Women Development Centre in Uvwie Local Government Area of Delta State.

    The facility was constructed under CNL’s Project Specific Agreement (PSA) with the Urhobo host community and is aimed at sustainable development of the host community through its women folks.

    The Secretary to the Delta State Government, Mr Ovouzorie Macaulay, who was a special guest at the occasion, described the centre as an edifice that would be a money-spinner for the community and urged the people to put it to the best use.

    Macaulay, who was represented by Mr Vincent Omorie, described the ceremony as a dream come through for the people, urging them to “own the project; it can also be put into other commercial purposes. It should be driven to enviable height.

    He assured that the government would continue to intervene on behalf of the community and other host communities in the state.

    Earlier in his remark, the General Manager, Policy, Government and Public Affairs (PGPA), Chevron Nigeria Limited, Mr. Deji Haastrup, said NNPC/Chevron Joint Venture believes very strongly in partnership and is resolutely committed to enhancing partnership with relevant stakeholders to achieve the goal of sustainable development of communities around its areas of operations.

    Haastrup, who was represented at the occasion by Mr Trust Inimgba, said, “This achievement is a testimony to the company’s Tradition of Care for communities around its areas of operations and the value it places on women development as bedrock of the development of any society. I salute the Chairman and Members of the PSA Board, and members of the Project Review Committee for their commitment and selfless service.”

    While noting that NNPC/Chevron Joint Venture had continued to contribute to adding value to the lives of people around them, the Chevron’s PGPA GM encouraged the Ekpan people to put the facility to good use and maintain it for the benefit of the community.

    In the same vein, Mr. Haastrup commended the Delta State Government for the continued support, which he said facilitated the successful completion of the project and also the Ekpan traditional and community leaders for their commitment and support in actualizing the objective of the PSA.

    He added that without their support and cooperation, it would not have realized its mutual dream of providing the facility for the use of the women.

    He specifically thanked the Secretary to the Delta State Government, Comrade Ovouzorie Macaulay, who he said has shown high visibility throughout the planning and implementation of the project.

    Speaking on behalf of the beneficiary community, Mr Godwin Omasibro, Chairman of Ekpan Development Committee, commended the management of the American oil firm for judiciously and sincerely funding the project, which he described as “a befitting gift for developing the women of the community.

    “We sincerely cherish the commitment of the company to our wellbeing and socio-economic development and we promise to ensure that the centre being handed over to us today lives up to its primary objective of facilitating sustainable development of Ekpan community.”