Magnus Eze, Enugu
Enugu State Governor, Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi, on Tuesday night, led a team of security personnel and intercepted a trailer load of cattle with 15 men hidden on the floor of the vehicle.
The incident, which happened at about 9:00pm near the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport flyover on the Enugu-Abakaliki Expressway, involved a trailer said to be coming from Bauchi State.
The vehicle had beaten all security checkpoints on the highways and made its way into the state capital before it was intercepted by the governor who defied the heavy rains to enforce the dusk to dawn curfew imposed across the country by President Muhammdu Buhari.
The governor, after ordering that the men be brought down, lamented the porous nature of the interstate boundaries, noting that the fight against COVID-19 would be meaningless with the compromises going on at the boundaries.
He wondered how such number of people found their way into the state under the pretence of transporting cattle.
The men on interrogation claimed they were cattle traders heading to Gariki market in Enugu but missed their way. However, only one of them could produce an identity card belonging to cattle traders; when asked to prove their claim.