RAYMOND OZOJI reports
Security operatives under the Udo Ga Chi squad have intercepted two tricycles and one shuttle bus loaded with dead cows and goats used for rituals at Omambala river, Anambra-East Local Government Area of the state.
This journalist gathered that the sinister operation which occurred Monday night about 2am have been the situation for too long until the culprits were intercepted and apprehended by security operatives stationed at Umueri, when they were conveying their consignments from Omambala river to a certain woman in Onitsha, who ordered for the dead cows and goats inorder to resell to slaughter houses and butchers in Onitsha markets.
Further investigations revealed that the merchants of the dead cows and goats have been bribing security operatives in the area with N50,000 and N100,000 respectively to smuggle their consignments into Onitsha markets in the wee hours of the night regardless of its hazardous nature to public health.
But security operatives stationed at Umudiana Umueri resisted such bribe and insisted that the culprits must provide concrete explanations as to why they have dead cows and goats in their possession; where they got them and where they were taking them to by that time of the night.
Hence, the Chief Security Officer of Umudiana Umueri, Mr. Chukwunonso Nnete, who is also a member of the Operation Udo Ga Chi Security Team told this journalist that the suspects confessed that they got the dead animals from Agbanabu-Ezu Na Omambala, a river where rituals were performed.
Nnete further disclosed that the tricycle riders said some group of young men who specialized in bringing out the dead animals from the river usually informed their buyers that such materials were available and that when such happened, they contacted them to go and bring them to Onitsha for onward sales to food vendors, butchers and other buyers respectively.
He informed that the suspects confessed they were taking the dead animals to a woman in Onitsha who usually stored them in a cold room and thereafter take them to the markets to sell to meat dealers who also retailed to canteen operators, eateries, and others in the retail food chain.
According to him, the Keke operators and the shuttle bus driver pleaded for them to be released and equally called the woman who ordered for the dead animals used for rituals and she offered to bribe them with N100,000 which they refused but insisted that she should come and explain why she ordered for the ritual items.
The Umudiana Umueri CSO who stated that the Onitsha woman stopped taking calls from them when they insisted that she must come in person to do some explanations, said the suspects including a woman whose stock-in-trade was to buy chickens and goats used for sacrifices were later handed over to the police for further investigations.
Meanwhile the President-General of Umueri community Chief John Metchie, thanked Umudiana Umueri security operatives for their efforts in securing and protecting the community from criminal elements, adding that Umueri is a peaceful community and conducive for investment opportunities as adjudged by a real estate company called Reapfold Properties Limited.
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