JTF/Armed Policemen Takeover Delta Communities Over Ethnic Crisis

Following the mayhem which broke out on Monday at the riverside communities in Warri , Delta State where eight persons were killed, men of the Military Joint Taskforce(JTF), and armed mobile policemen have taken over the entire communities with movement of persons restricted.

Armed youths suspected to be Ijaw warlords allegedly attacked their Itsekiri neighbours where no fewer than eight persons were killed.

But the JTF media coordinator, Lt. Col. Onyema Nwachukwu, told journalists yesterday that the presence of the Joint Military Taskforce and the mobile policemen was to forestall the breakdown of law and order in the areas adding that six person have been arrested in connection with the mayhem.

LEADERSHIP checks revealed that though there were still pockets of tension among the two groups, the fierce looking security agents have taken measures to bring to book unscrupulous elements.

Unconfirmed report indicate that the ethnic crisis had been festering since 2012 when two Ijaws were allegedly killed by Itsekiri warlords. The police spokesman in the state, ASP Lucky Uyabeme, however said that their deaths were as a result of cult related activities.

Speaking to journalists in Asaba, secretary to the state government, Comrade Ovouzurie Macaulay, disclosed that the state government will invoke the full weight of the law to deal with those found to have been causing disharmony among neighbouring communities.