How Youths beat vigilance group operatives to stupour for disrupting ritual

Some youths from Abacha and Nimo, in Njikoka Local Government Area of Anambra State have reportedly attacked and beat two members of a vigilance group to stupour for interrupting a native doctor carrying out rituals for them.

According to a source, the native doctor was arrested by the vigilance group operatives while conducting a ritual on Nimo-Abacha road and whisked him away.

As soon as information about the arrest reached the youths, they quickly mobilised a chase party for the vigilance men, whom they eventually arrested and took to the residence of the native doctor where they were dealt with severely.

It was, however, reported that before the vigilance group members were arrested by the hoodlums, they had already released the native doctor after been satisfied that he had no bad motive or was a security risk.

This did not deter the youths who were angered by the disruption of the ritual of the native doctor. The two victims were assaulted with their security weapons that included machete, axe, club and the butt of their guns, causing them to slump before they were eventually resuscitated.

The youths in a bid to exonerate themselves from any calamity, allegedly labelled the duo as cultists and took them to the Special Anti-Cultism Squad (SPACS) of the state police command at Enugwu Ukwu.

Commander of SPACS, Mr. Christopher Bassey, who confirmed the incident, said it had to do with communal crisis between Nimo and Abacha and not cultism as alleged. He noted that the victims have been taken to a nearby hospital for treatment, adding: “I don’t want to be involved in community crisis.”

Reacting to the incident, leader of the security outfit, Uche Rogers, hinted that both communities agreed that nobody would offer sacrifice along the said road and wondered why the native doctor should go contrary to the law.

He added that as the security outfit in charge of the area, it also guards the state government’s orthopaedic hospital in Abacha, under construction, which is close to the boundary between the two communities.