By Ikechukwu Amaechi
Sir,
Let me apologise from the onset for reaching you through this medium, considering that a private, albeit, official letter may have been more ideal. But two things informed my choice of open letter. First, I don’t want the letter to be lost in transit, mislaid in the miasma of officialdom. Second, time is of the essence here.
So, my hope is that even if you don’t get to read this letter first-hand, someone who did will promptly draw your attention to it. I am also aware that Mr. Okechukwu Nwanguma, Executive Director, Rule of Law and Accountability Advocacy Centre, RULAAC, sent a petition to you on Monday, May 8, on the same issue. This letter is to reinforce the position of RULAAC on the travails of Citizen Thaddeus Ikechukwu Ojokoh in the hands of officers and men of the Nigeria Police Force, Imo State command.
Here
are the facts of the matter: On Saturday, April 15, 2023, an Afor market day in
Ala-Igbo, Thaddeus Ikechukwu Ojokoh, a 53-year-old professional tailor, from
Umugwa Umuokirika, Ahiazu-Mbaise local government, Imo State, was arrested at
Afor-Oru market. Ojokoh, who is married with five children, had just left his
shop where he has been practising his humble trade in the last two decades to
buy some tailoring materials when armed security men swooped on him and whisked
him away on the allegation that he is a member of the proscribed Indigenous
Peoples of Biafra, IPOB.
Since that fateful Saturday afternoon, he has
been in police custody at their detention facility called “Tiger Base” in
Owerri. Then, on April 21, six days after his arrest, hoodlums attacked
policemen on duty at Ngor-Okpala and killed four of them. On April 30, the Imo
State Police Command issued a statement claiming that “nine suspected IPOB/ESN
terrorists” had been arrested over the heinous crime. Ordinarily, that would
have been good news.
Wanton killing of policemen is abominable and
condemnable. But there was a snag. Imo police under the “indefatigable” CP
Mohammed Ahmed Barde claimed that Ojokoh was one of the culprits. The April 30
statement titled: “Operation restore peace: Imo police arrest nine suspected
IPOB/ESN terrorists; including Mbaise/Ngor-Okpala IPOB/ESN sector commander,
recovers arms and ammunition,” was quite incongruous.
“Sequel to the attack of Police Officers on patrol attached to Ngor-Okpala/Mbaise Area Command at Ngor-Okpala, Imo State on April 21,2023 by hoodlums suspected to be members of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB and its militia affiliate, Eastern Security Network, ESN, where four gallant police officers lost their lives, the indefatigable Commissioner of Police, Imo State, CP Mohammed Ahmed Barde PSC(+) after on the spot assessment of the incident, directed the Command’s tactical teams to commence detailed investigation and manhunt to unravel the perpetrators of the dastardly act,” the statement read.
“Acting on the CP’s
directives, a detachment of the Command’s tactical team on April 24, 2023 at about
1730hrs after diligent gathering of credible intelligence, arrested one Mathew
Chuwkuma 48yrs ‘m’ of Mpam Ahiazu Mbaise LGA, Imo State, in his hideout at
Umuahia, Abia State.
“He confessed to be the Sector Commander of a
dreadful IPOB/ESN syndicate in Mbaise and assisted the curious operatives in
arresting three of his syndicate namely; Ojoko Ikechukwu 53yrs ‘m’ of Umugwa,
Chilaka Charles 44yrs ‘m’ of Umuezuo, and Anthony Iwu 50yrs ‘m’ of Umugwa all
in Umuokiria, Ahiazu Mbaise LGA of Imo State in their criminal hideout while
others escaped.” The police statement claimed that the accused, including
Ojokoh, had admitted to the killings.
This is rather preposterous and beggars
belief. It also raises fundamental posers. Is it possible that the police did
not realise that Ikechukwu Ojoko who they arrested on April 15 is the same man
they paraded as one of the felons in a crime committed on April 21? If they
truly did not know, what does that say about current state of policing in Imo
State? That will be frightening, to say the least. It will even be more so if
they knew but, nevertheless, wilfully hung the crime on Ojoko’s fragile neck.
Unfortunately, many believe that the latter is
the case. And many innocent youths have needlessly lost their lives, collateral
damages in the inexplicable and hare-brained policing approach. How could
Ojokoh have partaken in that dastardly act? For crying out loud, he was in
police custody as at the time of the gruesome murders.
Again, he was arrested at Afor-Oru market and
not at any “terrorist hideout” as claimed by police and no “incriminating
items” were found on him. It also bears restating that the police never
conducted any search either at his house or shop. Now, what is most telling in
this ugly saga is that everyone who has reached out to me since I sent out an
SOS message on Sunday gave the same advice: “Ikechukwu, please do something
fast before it is too late.”
That advice is informed by the fact that if nothing is done urgently to get him out of the police gulag, there are chances of waking up one morning and learning that he has been summarily executed. That is how bad things are. It is frightening to imagine that young men in police custody could be roused from sleep in the middle of the night, marched to the nearest bush and summarily executed and the only explanation, if one is fortunate to get any, will be that they died while trying to escape from detention.
While the unconscionable killing of security officers or any human
being for that matter is condemnable and anyone who commits such heinous crime
for whatever reason must be made to face the full wrath of the law, it is
equally fiendish to frame innocent, poor folks for crimes they never committed
all in the name of fighting insurgency.
Nwanguma alluded to this in his petition to
you Sir on this extant matter when he stated: “It has also become necessary to
call the IGP’s attention to the attitude of many police officers in the
Southeast presuming everyone accused of being an IPOB member of having
automatically lost their constitutionally guaranteed rights to due process,
including the presumption of innocence until otherwise proven in a fair trial.
This is a very dangerous attitude that has led to the murder of many innocent
citizens.
The Constitution guarantees every person
arrested for a recognisable offence the right to fair trial. Summary executions
and extrajudicial killings amount to murder and can have ugly repercussions
including creating a cycle of violence.” In the last 27 days since Thaddeus
Ikechukwu Ojoko was arrested on trumped up charges, he has been held
incommunicado. Police at Tiger Base have refused his family members,
particularly his wife, access to him. Lawyers have also not been able to see
him.
The art of policing could, and, indeed, should
have a human face. Whenever the police are certain that someone has committed a
crime, such a person should be arraigned before a court of competent
jurisdiction. That is the only standard the law permits in any decent society.
Extrajudicial killings, torture and maiming of
suspects and indefinite confinement amount to gross violation of human rights.
Accusing a man falsely of a heinous crime when prima-facie evidence proves
otherwise and parading him in public with assorted weapons and charms is
inhumane. Now, when he comes out tomorrow as he surely will because the police
have nothing against him, how on earth will he overcome the psychological
trauma of seeing his face in the pages of newspapers and his children watching
the video clip of their father on You-tube paraded as a murderer?
How can that grave injustice ever be
mitigated? At the rate these injustices are perpetrated in the Southeast, they
are tilting towards crime against humanity. I am pleading most passionately
with you, IGP Usman Baba Alkali, that given your well-known reputation as a
disciplined officer with a fervent desire to give policing in Nigeria a human
face, you step into this matter before an innocent soul is wasted on the altar
of Imo police impunity.
*Amaechi,
the publisher of TheNiche, is a commentator on public issues
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