Cross-River: Police Command dispatch officers to investigate missing rifle

The Cross River State Police Command has dispatched a team of officers from the intelligence unit of the command in search of a rifle that was snatched from one of its men.

The rifle was snatched when some youths who allegedly came from Oku in Boki Local Government Area, stormed the Divisional Police Station in the area at around 11pm on Thursday night to release one of their members that was arrested by the police.

The arrest of the suspect followed the ongoing crisis in the Boki oil palm estate where some aggrieved youths from one of the communities of the estate refused to work in harmony with Mr. Macthomy Agan whom the state governor, Prof. Ben Ayade gave control of the estate.

Following the crisis, a number of youths from one of the landlord communities, Oku, were arrested and brought to the state police command in Calabar for allegedly causing mayhem in the area.

The state commissioner of police, Mr Hafiz Inuwa, told Southern City News on Friday that he had dispatched a team of intelligence officers to recover the snatched rifle.

“One of our rifles was snatched when some youths from one of the landlord communities of the estate stormed the divisional police station at night to release one of their members. We must get back our rifle; we will not tolerate any more nonsense from those people,” he said.

Agan, who is a Special Adviser on Infrastructure to Ayade, said he was given the mandate to manage the estate by the state governor.

He said that some youths and elders from Oku who usually own more than five plots in the estate are now aggrieved because the new policy of `one man one plot’ does not favour them anymore.

“We are working hard to revive this estate and to generate more revenue for the state government. I have called all the youths and elders from the four landlord communities to support me in restoring peace in the estate but to no avail.

“I thank God that the police and other security agencies are currently on ground and doing their work in arresting all those causing violence here,” he said.

Source: ( Punch Newspaper )