By Vincent Kalu
The Umobor village in Akaeze community, Ivo Local Government Area of Ebonyi State, has appealed to the state governor, Francis Nwifuru to compel Ogwor village in Ishiagu community to abide by the Supreme Court judgment over the age long land dispute between the two communities.
Umobor and Ogwor communities are in the same local government area, but have had a land tussle since 1923.
The area in dispute called Elueke is a fertile land, whose ownership has been a subject of dispute between the two communities.
Previous governments of the state have not been able to proffer solutions to the problem.
Following the recent crisis that has claimed about six lives, Governor Nwifuru, who declared the disputed land a buffer zone, summoned the stakeholders of the affected areas in his office, constituted a reconciliation committee and gave them two weeks to make peace or risk losing the land to the government.
However, Umobor village in a letter to the governor by their counsel, Mike Ahamba, SAN, appealed that Ogwor people should abide by the Supreme Court judgement of 1991.
Chief Ahamba, in a letter to Governor Nwifuru traced the legal tussle over the ownership of the land from when the Ogwor people took the Umobor people to the Native Court in that area, but lost.
According to the letter, the Ogwor community approached the High Court at Abakaliki, in Suit No. AB/3/71, and they lost again in the judgment delivered on the 25th day of March, 1974.
Still not satisfied, Ogwor people appealed to the Court of Appeal, Enugu in Appeal No. FCA/E/201/81, and again, lost in the judgment delivered on July 1, 1987.
Ogwor further appealed to the Supreme Court of Nigeria in Supreme Court No.SC/3/1990, but also lost at the Apex Court in a judgment delivered on September 27, 1991.
Chief Ahamba called on the governor to impress on the security agencies in the state to enforce the Supreme Court judgment on Ogwor village.