By George Onah

Port Harcourt- Following the dumping of 12 corpses at Ula Ikata Junction of Ahoada East Local Government Area, Rivers State, by unknown persons, residents of the community have fled the area, to escape arrest by security agencies.

Vanguard gathered, Sunday, from residents that at 8.20 pm, Thursday, they heard the blaring of siren from two vehicles coming from the Yenagoa, Bayelsa-State-end of East-West Highway.

An indigene of the area said: “They stopped at the junction and some armed men jumped out of the cars; shortly after, the bodies were thrown out from the vehicles and it was after the men had left, that we managed to go closer and discovered that the hands of the bodies were tied behind their backs and the corpses were covered with scabies. Many of them were partially nude.”

“As soon as the vehicles stopped, the gunmen started shooting sporadically into the air to scare us. The men may have been executed early that day from wherever, but dumped in our community to put us in trouble,” said another resident, who did not want his name in print.

The villagers said the fact that the bodies had scabies suggest that the men may have been arrested, kept in a dirty environment for long before being killed and kept for nearly 24 hours before they were deposited at Ula Ikata.

Chairman of the council, Chief Cassidy Ikegbidi, condemned the dumping of the corpses in the area, pointing out that the act was inhuman and a shock to the people of the area.

He said: “Those corpses were not indigenes of this council. No one in the area could identify any of the corpses.” He condemned the act where people would be killed in an unknown place and dumped at his council.

Worried by the sudden refugee status which they had acquired, the villagers called on the police to remove the dumped corpses.

However, Police Public Relations Officer, Mr. Ben Ugwuegbulam, said the command had “commenced full investigations into the incident,” adding that what happened was “barbaric and unacceptable” and that the public would not be kept in the dark after the investigation.