By: Felix Ikpotor
As the ongoing wrangling between the Rivers State government and men of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad, SARS, continues, the government has appealed to members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state to shelve their planned solidarity march in support of SARS in the state.
PH Spectator recalls that the Rivers State Governor, Chief Nyesom Wike had severally accused SARS as being behind many high profile crimes in the state.
Wike in a statement released in Port Harcourt by his Commissioner for Information and Communications, Mr. Emma Okah said it is disheartening that some politicians are importing hostile politics and divisiveness into crime fighting and prevention thereby weakening the efforts of the state government in ensuring that the state is safe for all.
According to Okah, the media space is full of bitter stories and indeed the Government of Rivers State has continuously raised the alarm over the criminal atrocities of some operatives of SARS in Rivers State without any concrete action been taken by the police high command.
He added that it will amount to extreme wickedness for anyone to applaud the same SARS through solidarity march.
He said: “Crime has no border and knows no political party, sex or religion and as often as there is harm or threatened harm to a society, the stakeholders should stand together and in one voice, confront the challenge”.
Okah noted that it is disheartening for anybody or indeed the APC to fraternize with SARS when the growing allegations of killing, kidnap, armed robbery, extortion amongst others made against them remain uninvestigated saying, “to do so will be the shame of Rivers State and a demonstration of a diminished brotherhood among Rivers people”
The government said while it will continue to support security agencies in the discharge of their duties in state, it will be in the collective interest of the people of the State to stop politicising crime and promoting deep seated political hatred as the duty to protect the state rests on all.
“While governments will come and go, the State will remain for all of us and future generations. Therefore SARS should be our friends, inspire public trust in the police and not be our enemies or a source of fear, agony, pain and anguish in Rivers State and as often as they torment Rivers people, nobody should play Pontius Pilate ” Okah said.
