BY Peter Duru
MAKURDI — Few days after raising alarm over rising waves of political violence in Benue State, a federal lawmaker representing Katsina-Ala/Logo/Ukum Federal Constituency, Mr. Mzenda Iho, narrowly escaped death after a group of alleged Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, thugs attacked him and his entourage in Katsina-Ala.

Iho, who recently decamped from PDP to the Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN, escape the attack unhurt. However, he lost one of his followers to the assailants who used machette on him before taking him away.

Narrating the incident to newsmen at the state Police headquatres, the lawmaker explained that he was on his way to Tor Donga for the burial of a close relative when his entourage ran into a group of PDP thugs.

He said they barricaded the road at the Radio Benue substation in Katsina-Ala few minutes after he drove past the caretaker chairman of Kastina-Ala  Local Government Council, Mr. Augustin Avaan.

He stressed that at that point he beckoned on members of his entourage and drove straight to the Katsina_Ala Police Station to report the matter and also seek protection.

Iho lamented that the hoodlum tailed him to the station where a member of his entourage was attacked and abducted.
The incident prompted the immediate transfer of the case to the State Police Headquarters for further investigations.

Vanguard gather that among those arrested by the Police was the Katsina_Ala local government council chairman  Mr. Augustine Avaan who was later granted bail on self recognition but 8 others were remanded in police custody pending further investigations into the matter.

When approached to elicit his reaction on the incident, Mr. Avaan decline comments on the issue saying rather, ‘I do not want to speak on the matter’.

Meanwhile, the Police has drafted men to Katsina_Ala to apprehend all those behind the attack on the federal lawmaker.

Vanguard recalls that few days ago the State Chairman of the ACN, Comrade Abba Yaro and the State Secretary narrowly escaped death after armed assailants shot at them while on their way to a party function in the outskirt of Makurdi town. That matter is also being investigated by the Police.