The Association of Ebonyi State Indigenes in the Diaspora (AESID) has called for a full-scale investigation to unravel the cause of the abduction and killing of five consultant engineers working at the African Development Bank (AfDB) by some unknown gunmen.
The five engineers, working with an Enugu-based consultant engineering firm, were reportedly missing on November 3 after they were deployed to a road project at Effium in Ebonyi State in continuation of routine supervisory works.
The victims were identified as Mr Nelson Onyemeh, Mr Stanley Nwazulum, Mr Ernest Edeani, Mr IK Ejiofor and Mr Samuel Aneke.
Expressing its worries through a statement on Monday in Abuja, AESID’s President, Paschal Oluchukwu, called on security agencies in Nigeria to thoroughly investigate and unravel those who have hands in the unfortunate incident.
The statement said: “We join the family and indeed, other civil society groups like Intersociety which have all spoken up on this dastardly act to not only condemn the sad incident.
“It is our principal belief that matters such as this, so long as it concerns our dear state and its people cannot be swept under the carpet through unofficial but surreptitious executive antics.
“We, therefore, implore the various security agencies in Nigeria to thoroughly investigate…those in his [Umahi’s] government who may have been suspected to have a hand in this unfortunate incident.”
While raising concern over the mysterious and suspicious deaths associated with the road project, the diaspora group said; “the mysterious deaths pervading this important road project, especially coming few months after the yet-another suspicious death of Engineer Fidelis Nweze, a Commissioner, who was before his death, was the Chairman of the Ebonyi State Project Implementation Unit for the AfDB- financed Ring Road Project.
“Already, these sad ugly incidents have…affected the overall public perception of our people as aggressive, savagery, bestial and anti-developmental progress.”
The statement also said that; “governor Umahi and his government was yet to launch some deeply serious probe into the mysterious disappearance and killing of the said contractors.
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