. police, vigilance still beef up security at Igwe’s palace
. his death turned my Nwafor festival mood into sadness – monarch
By CHUKS EKE
Normalcy appeared to have returned to Ogidi community in Idemili North Local Government Area of Anambra state, after a four-day pandemonium which trailed the death of a youth leader, Chike Okoye.
The pandemonium had sparked off last Thursday shortly after the late Chike Okoye allegedly jumped out of a two-storey building in a bid to evade an arrest by a police team who stormed his Umueze Alor village to arrest him for allegedly leading a protesting angry youths to Ogidi police station to forcefully secure the bail of one of the youth leaders earlier arrested and detained by the police for malicious damage.
The pandemonium climaxed on Friday morning when the news of Okoye’s death filtered into the ears of the people of Umueze Alor village, Ogidi and that his corpse had even been deposited at the Iyi-Enu Mission hospital morgue, Ogidi, as the youths made bone fire with used tyres and barricaded the ever-busy Onitsha-Enugu old road and made straight to the morgue, brought out the corpse and rushed to the palace of Igwe (Pharmacist) Alex Onyido where they deposited it and dispersed.
The pandemonium attracted heavy presence of security apparatus at the Palace of Igwe Onyido, to the extent that an Armoured Personnel Carrier, APC was stationed permanently right in front of Igwe’s Palace entrance gate till the time of filing this report, while a team of policemen and vigilante operatives patrol inside and outside the palace.
However, on Sunday, the leadership of Ogidi Union Nigeria, OUN led by its President-General, High Chief Chuka Onubogu and the Igwe-in-Council had a crucial meeting of all the cabinet members and other stakeholders at Igwe’s Palace shortly after they paid a condolence visit to the bereaved family.
Before their departure to the bereaved family, the palace was thrown open for individuals and groups, including masquerades and cultural groups to troupe into the palace to pay homage and solidarity visits to their cherished monarch and they were lavishly entertained with foods and drinks by the palace stewards.
At the bereaved family, the PG, Onubogu expressed their sincere condolence to the family on behalf of Igwe Onyido, the Igwe-in-council and the entire people of Ogidi. Onubogu also handed over the mortuary papers to the bereaved family and promised that the town union and Igwe-in-council would play active role during the funeral ceremony to buttress their point that they were not happy with the death of the young man.
Onubogu regretted that he had earlier advised the youths not to engage in the protest march to the police station to force the police to release the youth leader who was initially arrested for malicious damage, adding that if they had heeded to his advice, this kind of unfortunate scenario would not have occured.
Flanked by prominent cabinet members of Ogidi, including the traditional Prime Minister of Ogidi (Onowu), Chief Ifeanyi Udokwu; the Chairman of Igwe-in-council, Chief Udeogalanya; Prof. Philip Nwabueze Atanmuo, Chief Sam Mendu, Chief Ugochukwu Okwosa (Owelle Ogidi),among others, Onubogu maintained that the entire Ogidi people had taken everything that transpired behind and were now pursuing for a peace process to ensure that the revered Ogidi Chieftaincy stool was not desecrated to the detriment of every sons and daughters of the ancient community that produced Chinua Achebe and others.
Reacting to the development, Igwe Onyido expressed sadness that the death of the young man has changed his Nwafor Ogidi annual cultural and masquerade festivals mood from good to bad, adding that when the youths visited his palace and demanded for the release of the detained youth leader, he obliged them by calling on the CP and DPO to release him for the youths but because the DPO said he would release him the next morning, the youths went berserk and took their protest down to the police station, which necessitated the hunting of their leaders after they had dispersed.
On what he meant by saying that the youth leader was arrested by the police for malicious damage, Igwe Onyido explained that he constructed a concrete slab to make a certain road passable and the kindred who owned the land, out of mere suspicion that he (Igwe) wanted to take their land away from them, decided to take laws into their hands by demolishing the concrete slab, which necessitated the arrest of the first youth leader and which attracted the protests by the youths for his immediate release.
On where he was when the angry youth brought Okoye’s corpse into his palace, Igwe noted that he was upstairs but did not turn his eyes towards that gate to avoid seeing the corpse since it is a taboo for an Igwe in Igbo land to see a corpse.
He therefore pleaded with the bereaved family to accept his condolences as he did not mean any harm to any of his subjects, since he is the father of everybody, both the stubborn and the gentle ones.
He said he learnt that the deceased was an asthmatic, diabetic High Blood Pressure patient and that was why when he jumped out of the two-storey building, he started breathing fastly until he was rushed to the hospital where the doctors battled to revive him to no avail until he passed on most probably as a result of the asthma endemic, combined with diabetes and BP..
