Thugs, allegedly led by a top government official, on Tuesday,
unleashed terror on protesting widows when they beat them mer-cilessly
in Owerri, Imo State.
The widows, numbering over 2,000, under the aegis of Imo Wid-ows
Association (IWA) and drawn from the 27 local government ar-eas of the
state, had assembled at the Okigwe Road roundabout, a few metres from
the Government House, Owerri at about 8.45am, to protest the injustice
against Min-ister of State for Education, Pro-fessor Viola Onwuliri.
The protesting women alleged that another group of women, suspected to
be agents of the gov-ernment, had, last week in Ower-ri, accused the
Minister of killing her husband, Prof. Celestine On-wuliri, who died
in a plane crash.
While the widows were protest-ing with their placards reading ''An
injustice to a widow, is an injustice to all! Governor Rochas Okorocha
leave Prof. Viola Onwu-liri alone! Onwuliri had assisted us a lot'',
some young men, sus-pected to be cultists, emerged and started pelting
the protesters with sachets of 'pure water' before flogging them with
canes and other objects.
The thugs, who were allegedly supervised by the Commissioner for Youth
and Sports, Mr Ken-neth Emelu, ambushed the wid-ows at Item Street, an
adjoining street to Wetheral Road, where the thugs beat them
mercilessly, while some women, allegedly mobilised by the state
govern-ment also attacked the widows.
The Nigeria Television Au-thority (NTA) cameraman, Mr. Eric Etuk, who
was covering the protest was beaten while his camera was snatched by
the hoodlums.
--DailyTimes
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