The police in Edo State have arrested a former chairman of the banned Community Development Association (CDA) and two others over alleged unlawful possession of firearms.
It was gathered that the police who followed a tip off, made the arrest and recovered a pump action rifle in the private residence of the former CDA chairman, Monday Edegbe in Uniaro village, Ovia North East LGA of the state.
It was further gathered that others arrested alongside Edegbe, identified simply as Peter and Obong were his tenants.
It was learnt that a picture in which one of the tenants posed with the gun in his bedroom triggered the investigation which led to the arrest.
Speaking to journalists, the Odionwere of Uniaro, Pa Osayande Ogbeide, appealed to security agencies to ensure that those involved were made to face the full wrath of the law to serve as a deterrent to others.
He alleged that the former CDA chairman, Edegbe, had been a thorn in the flesh of the community, saying that he had on different occasions arrested elders in the community on trumped up charges leading to their being detained for several days by the police.
Responding at the state police command headquarters where he was being detained, Edegbe denied the allegations, saying that though the gun was recovered in his house, it was planted by his enemies to implicate him.
He said since CDA was disbanded in the state he had not visited his village let alone hide a gun in his house there, adding that his tenants said one Actor Omoregie gave them the gun to keep in the house just to put him in trouble.
The state command’s Public Relations Officer, DSP Chidi Nwanbuzor, said the police are on the trail of the man alleged to have planted the gun.
