‘Army Must Hand Over Soldier Who Shot Woman in Delta’

Omon-Julius Onabu in Asaba

Executive Director of human rights group, the centre for the vulnerable and the underprivileged (CentreP), Oghenejabor Ikimi, has condemned last Saturday’s shooting incident at Effurun, near Warri, Delta State, which led to the death of a woman hit by a bullet from a soldier’s gun.

The woman, identified as Mrs Alice Akparobi, a mother of four and a typist with the Delta State Judiciary attached to the Magistrate Court, Oleh, aged 53 years, was killed by a soldier at an army checkpoint at Jakpa Junction, Effurun.

Ikimi said in the statement e-mailed to THISDAY in Asaba that the killing was unwarranted and callous as the woman was an innocent commuter who was being conveyed to her third daughter’s church wedding.

“Citizen Alice Akparobi had on the 30th day of April, 2016 a sanitation day in Delta State, boarded a tricycle and was heading for her daughter’s church wedding same day when they were flagged down by a five-man team of armed soldiers at the said checkpoint, but rather than obey the soldiers, the said tricycle rider refused to stop and one of the soldiers in the process opened fire on the said tricycle hitting the deceased who was a passenger in the said tricycle.

“Citizen Alice Akparobi was abandoned by the said soldiers in the pool of her blood and after 20 minutes of the deceased wailing in the pool of her blood she gave up the ghost as the soldiers refused to help.”

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