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Ozubulu Massacre: Police Deploy 500 Officers As Target ‘Bishop’ Buries His Father

Published

6 years ago

January 12, 2018

The police plans to deploy 500 policemen to Ozubulu community in Anambra State as the alleged target of the 2017 church shooting Aloysius Ikegwuonu aka Bishop buries his father, Punch reports.

13 persons had been killed after gunmen stormed St. Phillips Catholic Church, Ozubulu in August, 2017. Another 29 had been wounded, and reports claimed the gunmen had been in search of Bishop, a South African based Nigerian businessman who was in Nigeria visiting. His father, Cyprian Ikegwuonu, was one of the deceased in the attack, and Bishop, speaking to journalists on Thursday, said everything is in place to give his father a befitting burial.

Tensions are however reported to be high in the community as the gunmen are expected to once again stage an attack during the funeral. A police source who spoke to Punch claimed the decision has been made to deploy 500 policemen to Ozubulu to keep the peace.

The Anambra State Police Public Relations Officer, Nkeiruka Nwode, who confirmed the deployment of policemen to the community, refused to state the number of officers deployed.

She stated that the police seeks to avoid a repeat of the killings, describing the event as unfortunate. She said: As we are talking now, so many of our men have been drafted to the community to make sure that adequate security is provided.

What happened on that fateful day was unfortunate and the command does not want to encounter such again in this state or elsewhere. Every single person or group coming for the burial will be adequately screened because the command sees the security of the people as our number one priority.