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From Aloysius Attah, Onitsha
The mother of two suspects arrested in the murder of the President-General of Umuoji community in Idemili North Local Government Area of Anambra State, Mrs. Elizabeth Igwe, has called for a fresh investigation into the murder of the town union leader.
Addressing newsmen in Onitsha, yesterday, Mrs Igwe, who spoke through her first daughter, Onyinye Igwe, a make-up artist, also called on both the Governors of Anambra and Ebonyi states, Chukwuma Soludo and Francis Nwifuru, respectively, to intervene in the case, to ensure that justice is carried.
She said her two children: Okey and Makua Igwe, who are currently incarcerated at the Onitsha Correctional Centre over the killing of Chief Silas Onyima, were not the ones who killed the man.
Mrs Igwe said she was not around when the incident happened as she travelled to Ebonyi State to take care of her ailing mother, but she had met with her children at the Correctional Centre to inquire from them what actually happened. Both of them, she said, denied being involved in the murder.
The woman said they had lived in the PG’s place for over 30 years and his children took Chief Onyima as their uncle, wondering why they could have mustered the courage to carry out such a dastardly act against somebody they regarded as their uncle.
She called on the Inspector-General of Police (IG) to, in collaboration with his colleagues of other security outfits, carry out a very painstaking investigation, adding that those around the PG could have been behind his murder. Mrs Igwe asked the police authority to invite the Personal Assistant (P.A) of the PG, to explain what he knows about the PG’s murder.
She said when her children heard that the PG was killed, Okey Igwe, who had gone to work in Lagos, and those who live in Awka, came back because he was their uncle. She said her two children were rounded up and were to be burnt if not for the intervention of one elderly man in the area who cautioned the people on the danger of taking laws into their own hands.
Then, they took them to the police, where they were detained for, at least, three weeks, while Okey and Makua were in detention, both at the State Criminal Investigation Department (CID) and SARS in Awkuzu, where they were tortured and forced to agree that they were responsible for the murder.
Mrs. Igwe said: “Makua told me that the PG’s PA kept on telling him to the police that I should admit that I am responsible for the PG’S murder that he will bail me later and send me abroad. It was the fear of the earlier threat from the PA and police torture that made me to admit”.
Mrs Igwe further called on “people of good conscience to intervene in this matter. I could not come back from Ebonyi State because I was told that if I came back, I would be a victim, too, like my children. How can we kill the PG? We have been in that compound for over 30 years. My appeal is that they should investigate PA properly and ask him what he was doing with PG’s bag after he had been murdered? They should not kill my children for an offence they did not commit.
“How can someone who was murdered in cold blood be buried instantly without thorough investigation. It seems that police personnel in Anambra State have been compromised in the matter because, if not, why did they release the PA and turn blind eyes to this aspect which my son told me,” she queried.
