A suspected cult leader yesterday told officers of the Bayelsa State Police Command how nine members of his cult group known as “Icelanders” raped a girl in the state capital. He also explained the group’s involvement in the killing of over 15 people in some parts of the state.
The arrested suspect, identified as Ebi, said that the arms and ammunition used in the cult war was secured from an undisclosed source in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, and that the battle was a supremacy one against the Vikings and the Greenlanders.
While confessing to the killing of a member of a rival cult group at Tombia in Yenagoa, the capital of the state, he said their leader was a man known as Fred.
Ebi further gave a gory account of how he, in company of three others, engaged in a raping spree without condoms in Yenagoa. He said four of them raped one of their victims without condoms, adding that the leader of the secret cult was also involved in many of the killings that had unsettled the state.
He revealed that his boss was responsible for the killings of three persons at Elebele in Ogbia local government area and that one person was also killed at Kpansia in Yenagoa by the leader.
Another suspect who failed to disclose his name said he killed one Mr. James in a cult-related skirmish at Ogume, just as another cultist claimed responsibility for the killings at Opolo area of the state capital.
The state commissioner of police, Mr. Musa Aliyu, who paraded the suspects before journalists in Yenagoa, said they were among the 29 people arrested for various criminal offences in the state.
LEADERSHIP gathered that most of the suspects were rounded up by operatives of the special police squad codenamed “Operation Famou Tangbei”.
Aliyu said that, in the past two weeks, the state had witnessed various cult activities in which rival cult groups engaged one another in shooting and maiming. He said suspects were apprehended following massive raiding of black spots and diligent stop-and-search operations initiated by the police.
On September 3, the police boss said, two boys were arrested in one of such operations along the Sani Abacha Expressway and a locally made pistol with one live cartridge was recovered from them.
He said the two suspects confessed to being members of the Vikings Confraternity. Aliyu stated that one of the suspects identified as Korea Anthony was arrested at one of the hotels in Opolo with one FNC rifle, adding that the gun was the one snatched from a policeman on duty at Tamic filling station last year.
Other suspects paraded included one Solomon Patrick and Elijah Eze who were apprehended at various robbery scenes, he said.
One G3 rifle, a pump action rifle, 45 ammunition of 7.62mm calibre; two ammunition of .99mm calibre and six live cartridges were recovered from the suspected robbers, Aliyu stated.
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