The Enugu Rescue Group, ERG, has condemned in strong terms the recent attack on Senator Ike Ekweremadu’s annual Ikeoha Foundation Free Eye Treatment Project in Ezeagu Local Government Area of Enugu State, calling for the immediate arrest and prosecution of the culprits.
In a statement signed by its Publicity Secretary, Comrade Martin Okenwa, and made available to reporters in Enugu on Tuesday, the group said the attack allegedly led by the Administrators of Ezeagu South and Ezeagu North Development Areas was another manifestation of political impunity and terrorism in Enugu State.
The statement reads in part: “In Enugu, we have seen labour leaders such as Comrade Osmond Ugwu framed up and throne in jail for daring to ask for better pay package for workers in the state; we have seen traditional rulers deposed for frivolous political reasons; we have seen our First Lady leave the Government House in most controversial circumstances; and we have seen a faithful Deputy Governor of over seven years toppled for the most ridiculous reasons in a chicken impeachment; but this attack on a medical team that was out to save lives is the cruelest of them all.
“It is a shame particularly on the perpetrators of this dastardly act of violence that they denied their people the opportunity to benefit from medical services, which had seen over 10,000 people successfully access free eye treatment, free drugs, free eye glasses, and eye surgeries in Udi, Awgu, Aninri, and Oji River LGAs, even when they could not provide same.
“We are more worried that they carried out the attack even after the Enugu State Police Commissioner had given permission for the exercise, having interacted with the medical team over the Council Chairman’s petition alleging that the medical team was coming to make trouble and finding the allegations to be unfounded and lousy”.
The ERG pointed out that the medical team had successfully carried out the exercise in Awgu, Oji River, Udi and Aninri Local Government Areas where thousands of people were attended to without authorities of these councils raising any eyebrow and wondered why officials of Ezeagu Council should decide to attack harmless persons that were in their area to held the needy.
The group argued that even if the perpetrators and their masters saw the 2015 election as total war, it was still a global convention to spare humanitarian service providers any deliberate aggression in times of war.
The ERG, therefore, urged the law enforcement agencies to “urgently fish out the ringleaders, their sponsors and accomplices and send them to jail immediately”.
