Akeredolu also noted that there is a terror gang in Okene that has been terrorising people in Kogi, Ekiti and Ondo States even before the Owo attack
By Kehinde Okeowo
The Ondo State governor, Rotimi Akeredolu, has cleared the air after he was quoted to have given the identities of the gunmen who recently killed 40 worshipers in a Catholic Church in Owo as Ebiras.
Akeredolu’s decision to mention the name of the tribe, an ethnic group in Kogi State, while receiving the leadership of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, NUJ, made most people conclude that the attackers of the church were Ebira people.
However, the Governor, while on Channels TV programme ‘Politics Today’ on Wednesday, August 10, admitted that some of those apprehended for the crime are Ebiras, but pointed out that the attackers might not all be from the same tribe.
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He added that his statement was taken out of context, as he only made reference to the Ebiras in respect of recent kidnapping incidents in the State and not the Owo terror attack.
Akeredolu said, “I don’t want to be emphatic on that point because what I said is being mixed up now,”
“I addressed issues on what I’ll call the attackers who came to Owo…the terrorists who came to Owo on June 5 and at the same time, I went ahead to address about kidnap incidents that we’ve had of recent and I said that probably the Ebira people were involved in this.
“And I said we’re gonna call a meeting between the Ebira community in Ondo State because we’ve lived together for too long for these incidents to begin to happen. That was a separate thing.
“But, it is clear that from what we have, that the terror gang in Okene were involved in the incident of June 5.
“What do we make of that? Are they all Ebiras? That’s for us to find out. Their names will not bring us to [reasonable] conclusion because as you can see, a number of them have two names…and the Department of State Services is still working on this.
“For me, I know that there’s a terror gang in Okene and everybody knows that. They strike across the country…they strike in Kogi, Ekiti and Ondo States,” he added.