By Peter Duru

THE Benue State Police Command has averted what would have resulted in a major bloodbath in Okpokwu Local Government Area of the state, following the arrest of 15 persons suspected to have been hired to cause commotion in the rescheduled ward congresses of the Peoples Democratic Party.

The command also impounded an official car loaded with arms and other dangerous weapons. The  recovered Toyota Corolla car with number-plate  LG 63 PKG, as gathered, belonged to one of the chairmanship aspirants at the rescheduled but stalemated ward congresses of PDP. The vehicle, which is at the  Okpokwu Divisional Police Headquarters, was said to be conveying some of the suspects to venues of the congresses about 9 a.m, last Sunday, when police operatives,  who acted on a tip-off, intercepted them.

Okpokwu, hometown of the Minister of Interior, Mr. Abba Moro, had in the the last few months, witnessed rising political tension, thereby  leading to several postponement of the PDP ward congresses in the area. The crisis is a fall-out of the alleged insistence of the state chairman of the party, to allow only 600 party members from each of the 13 wards in the area to participate in the congresses, a decision that was described as contrary to the party’s guidelines which provides that all card-carrying members of PDP should exercise their voting right.

Deputy Police Public Relations Officer for Benue Command, Assistant Superintendent of Police, Ejike Alaribe, confirmed that 15 hoodlums were arrested with some exhibits but did not give further details. He simply stated that, “what I can tell you is that some persons were arrested with exhibits but nobody has told me anything about arms and ammunition.”

Alarabe added that the suspects had been transferred to the Command Headquarters in Makurdi for further investigations, explaining that the arrest was consequent upon the increased security surveillance of the entire local government area by security operatives, who, he said, maintained utmost vigilance in the area owing to its volatility.