…Call for government intervention
People of Ogoni ethnic nationality in Rivers State are now seeking spiritual intervention to end the insecurity plaguing the area especially in Khana local government.
Our correspondent reports that despite efforts by stakeholders to restore peace in the area, cases of killings from cult clashes between rival cult groups are being recorded on weekly basis.
As a way of ensuring peace and to end gang violence in the area, a Christian dominated group from Ogoni has embarked on 14 days prayer and fasting programme to seek for God’s intervention.
President of the Ogoni Ministers, Peace and Advocacy Group, Joseph Johngbo who spoke at the event (fasting and prayer) in Bori, headquarters of Khana LGA, called on all Ogonis to pray for God’s intervention in the area.
He urged all sons and daughters of Ogoni to pray from their various locations for the peace of Khana local government area.
He said all hands must be on deck in ending insecurity in the area.
“You can see and agree with me that Ogoni where we used to live in peace is no longer a safe heaven.
“We are seeing villagers migrating from their homes and villages to Bori and onward movement from Bori to other cities”.
The clergy regretted that the insecurity has affected economic, religious, social and academic activities in the area.
“Economic activities is paralyzed, church services are no longer held in villages of Ogoni. Nothing is going forward in Ogoni.
“We are calling on everybody, daughters, sons and children of Ogoni, both at home and abroad to queue into this prayer. Wherever they go, from their churches, farms, offices and business places, they should ensure that they meditate and pray to God, ask for mercy, let God intercede on our behalf so that peace will return to Ogoni”.
In the same vein, the Paramount Ruler of Bua Boue Kingdom, in Khana local government area, His Royal Highness, Mene Taalor Tornwe has called on the state government, the Inspector General of Police and the State Commissioner of Police to urgently intervene to end the crisis the area.
The five communities that make up Bua Boue Kingdom have been listed as worst hit with cult clashes, as residents have fled their homes and are currently taking refuge in Bori, headquarters of the LGA and neighbouring communities.
Just recently, after the Rivers State Governor, Nyesom Wike at a grand reception organized in his honour by the people Ogoni had advised stakeholders in the area to ensure sustainable peace returns to the area, the following day, (Sunday), gunmen stormed Kono Boue, killing about four youths, while several other were injured.
Tornwe, who condemned the crisis that has bedeviled the kingdom, charged the youths especially those involved in cultism and other forms of violence to embrace peace.
The monarch pleaded with the Rivers state government and police to facilitate the building of a police station in Kono Boue, and ensure that all the cultists in the area are apprehended and brought to book.
Meanwhile, displaced indigenes of Kono Boue community in Bua Boue Kingdom have called on the Rivers State have sought for urgent intervention from the government.
They lamented that “Life is no longer what it used to be. How can we cope with nothing, no money, no food. The community is deserted. We can’t even go our farms to get food, we are hungry.
“We are calling on the government to come to our aid and stop these cultists from further killings and destruction of properties in our land”.
