Rivers Assembly Bombing: We Were Tortured, Offered ₦200 Million To Implicate Fubara’s CoS – Ezebalike

Three men who were previously arrested in connection with the arson that destroyed the Rivers State House of Assembly have alleged that their lives remain under threat after being discharged and acquitted by the court.

The men, Chime Ezebalike, Kenneth Kpasa, Prince Oladele Lukman, and MacPherson Olumini made this claim while speaking in Port Harcourt.

Naija News reports that the men stated that their persecution is linked to political forces opposed to the suspended Governor Siminalayi Fubara and his Chief of Staff, Edison Ehie.

Speaking on behalf of the others, according to Vanguard, Ezebalike said they felt compelled to speak to the press to clarify the situation surrounding the burning of the Rivers State Assembly.

According to him, the charges against them were politically motivated, and their refusal to implicate Governor Fubara’s loyalists in the crime had led to both physical and psychological abuse.

Ezebalike shared that they were offered a bribe of ₦200 million to falsely implicate Edison Ehie in the matter.

He continued, “Our offence was because we refused to frame individuals, including the Chief of Staff to the Rivers State Government, Rt. Hon. Edison Ehie, as masterminds behind the Rivers State House of Assembly inferno.”

Ezebalike recounted the ordeal they endured from December 2023 to January 2024, which he described as a period of intense harassment.

He said, “Starting from December 2023, we—Chime Ezebalike, Kenneth Kpasa, Prince Oladele Lukman, and MacPherson Olumini—were individually and collectively subjected to arrest, intimidation, physical assault, psychological torture. All of this happened between December 5, 2023, and January 16, 2024.”

He added that despite their innocence, they were tortured by the police and offered bribes in exchange for their freedom.

“At some point, we were offered bribes in exchange for our freedom even though it was clear that we had committed no offence that warranted our being arrested and detained,” Ezebalike said.

Details Of Arrests And False Accusations

Ezebalike explained that three of them, Chime, Kenneth, and Oladele were associates of Rt. Hon. Edison Ehie and Hon. Sokari Goodboy, while MacPherson was an innocent bystander.

The trouble began with the arbitrary arrest of Oladele Lukman on December 5, 2023, which was followed by a series of violent arrests.

On December 16, Chime and MacPherson were apprehended at Ogbakiri Junction along the East-West Road while returning from a funeral in Ahoada. Later, on January 5, Kenneth Kpasa was taken by force from GRA, Port Harcourt, by a convoy of no fewer than three Hilux vans.

They were blindfolded and transported to the Federal-Intelligence Response Team (F-IRT) unit along the Eastern Bypass in Port Harcourt, under the false claim that the vehicle they were in was stolen.

Ezebalike further claimed that they were falsely accused of being involved in the killing of the DPO of Ahoada Police Division, Bako Angbashim.

He stated that this accusation was part of an attempt to coerce them into implicating loyalists of Governor Fubara. “It was a ploy to coerce us into implicating the Fubara loyalists,” Ezebalike said.