The Kogi State Chairman of Christians Association of Nigeria (CAN), Bishop John Ibenu and a former minister from the state, Chief Gabriel Aduku, have escaped assassination attempts on them.

The clergy narrowly escaped death as unknown gunmen attacked him and riddled his car with bullets.

Narrating his ordeal to newsmen in Lokoja, the state capital on Thursday, Ibenu said he was returning from his village in the eastern part of the state at about 5.30 pm on Sunday when he was attacked.

According to him, about seven suspected Fulani men along Ojodu in Ofu local government area rushed out of the bush and open fire on his vehicle.

He explained that the assailants were on both sides of the road as four of the Fulani men rushed out from the bush and while attempting to make a u-turn, another three appeared from the bush and open gunfire on his vehicle.

Ibenu added that people were fully armed with AK47 rifles, but he was only able to escape from the scene to a nearby village with God grace.

He called on the state governor to intensify more effort in curbing criminal activities in the state.

According to him within a space of one week series of kidnapping incident were recorded along Lokoja-Ajaokuta road and other places in the state.

In the same vein, Aduku, a former Minister of state, Health was allegedly attacked by some gunmen men at his country home in Anyigba, Dekina local government area of the state.

According to a statement issued yesterday by the Secretary-General, Kogi East Elders’ Council (KEEC), Alphonsus Alhassan, which a copy was made available to THISDAY in Lokoja alleged that Aduku, who is the Deputy Chairman KEEC was accosted and man-handled at his residence in Anyigba, Kogi State.

The statement read, “The hoodlums in their twenties were six in number and were uninformed. Three stayed outside while three while two of them masked entered his sitting room through his kitchen.

“One of them carried a pump action rifle while the other two had pistols which they pointed at his head and informed him they were sent from Abuja to pick him for questioning.

“He refused to accompany them despite their physically trying to bundle him out as he insisted he would rather die within his compound if need be.”

He noted that they broke down two bedroom doors, seized his telephone sets, those of his aides and other valuables to make it appear like a robbery attack.

“We want to state that the signature of the perpetrators of this crime is not unambiguous.

“We have a very good idea of those behind the shameless and cowardly act. That the attack came a few weeks after the Kogi East Elders’ Council addressed a press conference in Abuja which was replied by a group who were so cowardly that they neither included their names and addresses in the rejoinder which they published in three national newspapers is
a pointer.

“It is obvious that since the hoodlums and their paymasters could not controvert the facts and kernel of our press conference which centred on the unmitigated misgovernance of Kogi State, rather than tow the path of moral rectitude, they have resorted to crude intimidation of elders old enough to be their fathers and grandfathers,” the statement added.

He added that no member of the Kogi East Elders’ Council appointed himself or herself. They did not even come together on their own will to form the Council, stressing that every single member was appointed in recognition of his or her antecedents and have been discharging this task sacrificially for the good of Kogi East Senatorial District.

“We will therefore not be intimidated or cowered by mannerless hoodlums whose stock-in-trade is gangsterism and terrorism,” he noted.