BY  JIMITOTA ONOYUME

It has been a season of explosions in Rivers State.  The most recent cases were the ones recorded in the early hours of Monday at Ahoada High Court in Ahoada East local government area and the one at Okehi High Court in Etche local government area.

In the Okehi incident, documents, furniture and other valuables were consumed in the inferno that came with the explosion. The state Police Public Relations Officer, DSP Ahmad Muhammad, confirmed the incident. Community sources said explosives were hurled into the court premises which allegedly triggered off the inferno.
The dust generated by that had hardly died down when news filtered into the state capital that  similar explosives were hurled into the  High Court premises in Ahoada local government area. The damage  was said to have been  minimal.

Some staff of the Ahoada High Court, who spoke to Sunday Vanguard, said the incident occurred before they resumed for work that Monday. The explosion caused a hole in the ceiling in the NBA building in the premises.
According to them, a second explosive would have gone off but for the timely intervention of the police that came to defuse it. The explosive, which some called dynamite, was neatly wrapped in a black polythene bag and dropped at the car park. It  was discovered by a litigant who came to the court premises.

The litigan raised the alarm when he noticed the strange object and this drew the attention of everybody. The  police were immediately contacted.
The anti-bomb unit of the police mobilized to the court and evacuated everybody in the premises before scanning the entire area.  They went away with the explosive.

Commenting on the development, the Rivers State PPRO, Muhammad, said the timely response of the police saved the situation. “A good Samaritan sighted something which looked like dynamite  and alerted the police. They quickly evacuated the area and removed the object”, he said. Muhammad  further confirmed that an explosion had earlier occurred at the premises.

His words, “We received a report that an object suspected to be an explosive was sighted at the premises of the High Court, Ahoada. A  team of  our anti-bomb squad was  despatched to make it safe. One unexploded IED was recovered and rendered safe while traces of an exploded IED were  identified. At the end of the operation, it was established that two IEDs were thrown into the premises from outside. The two were initiated but one went off while the other failed to go off due to technical error. The exploded IED caused a minor damage to the court building.

Neither injury nor death was recorded. Considering the strength of the materials used in making the devices, the devices were  very weak and could not cause severe harm but to make noise and not to pull down the building or cause death. Investigation into the incident has commenced with view of apprehending the perpetrators”.
Meantime, the Ahoada High Court workers said if the second explosive had gone off it would have had devastating effect on vehicles and probably claimed lives because it was dropped at the car park where most people were to have left their vehicles.

The court could not sit that day because of the incident.
Condemning the incident at the Okehi High Court, the member representing Etche /Omuma constituency in the House of Representatives, Hon Ogbona Nwuke, said it was clearly the handiwork of opposition politicians in the state, adding that they were enemies of democracy.

“My immediate reaction is that enemies of democracy are at work. Those who do not want to respect the rights of others, those who do believe in the rule of law and those who have no regards for people’s lives are at work,” the lawmaker said.
He called on security agencies to fish out those behind the act.

Also, a former House of Assembly aspirant from Etche LGA, Mr. Darlington Nwauju, who spoke to Sunday Vanguard on the development, appealed to the political class not to constitute any threat to the nation’s democracy. He said it was sad that the judiciary could be the target of attack by anyone.

The two major political parties in the state, the All Progressive Congress, APC, and the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, engaged in  blame game over the explosions.  Interim Chairman of the APC, Mr Davies Ikanya, in a statement,  said those behind the act were uncomfortable with the recent ruling of  Justice C. N. Wali of the  Ahoada court ordering Hon Evans Bipi  to stop parading himself as Speaker of the Rivers State House of Assembly.

On its part, the PDP, in a statement, blamed those allegedly against the Ahoada court sitting to reverse its decision on  Bipi as being behind the explosion.  Continuing, the Chairman, Mr Felix Obuah, said those behind the explosion at the Ahoada court also wanted to create a picture of an insecure Rivers State.

The Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, also condemned the bombings, describing the act as the  desecration of the temple of justice.  National president of the body, Mr Oke Wali SAN, charged the National Security Adviser and the Inspector General of Public to thoroughly investigate the incidents and make public their findings within thirty days.

Only last December, the Ahoada court was a target of bombers, thus bringing the incident of explosions  recorded in the court within two months to two. Some staff said they were worried with the way things were going on in the premises.

Also last December, an explosion  rocked the office of the Deputy Governor, Engr Tele Ikiru, in Government House, Port Harcourt. Some windows and car windscreens were allegedly destroyed in the incident. Before the Ikiru’s office incident, there was equally an explosion in Buguma during the inauguration of Save Rivers Movement. No life was lost but the incident caused tension and pandemonium in the area.
Residents of the state now live in fear of explosions.  It is like the political class think they score political goals when they detonate explosives.