BEVERLY HILLS, April 09, (THEWILL) – The Rivers State Government has placed a ban on a planned meeting of some Igbo residents in the Oyigbo Local Government Area over fears that such a meeting could spark a fresh round of unrest in the area.
The meeting by a group known as the United Igbo Community was originally arranged to hold at Oyigbo on Saturday, April 10, 2021.
In a statement signed by the Commissioner for Information and Communications, Paulinus Nsirim, the government directed security agencies “to ensure that the said meeting does not hold to forestall a breakdown of law and order in the area.”
Although the government was not specific about any security concern, Oyigbo Local Government Area, which shares a boundary with Abia State, is considered a stronghold of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), a proscribed group which the police blamed for the attacks on police officers and its facilities in the area shortly after the #EndSARS protests in October 2020.
The attacks led to a military operation in which soldiers and civilians were killed.
Apart from the fragile nature of Oyigbo following the October incident, the meeting of the Igbo community is coming up at a time when the nation is grappling with attacks on police formations in Imo, which happens to be another South-East state that shares a boundary with Rivers.
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