BY AGNES NWORIE, ABAKALIKI
Some suspected vandals of electricity transformers and poles at Okaria Nkaleke community in Ebonyi Local Government Area of Ebonyi State have attributed reasons for the act to their need to purchase working tools.
The suspects put up the excuse after being caught in the act by the executives of Scrap Dealers Association in the state. The suspects were nabbed while trying to sell copper cables at Nwezenyi axis of the state recently.
Ebuka Nwehihe, who admitted the crime, said he has automobile mechanic skills but lacked money to buy working tools, hence, he resorted to cutting electricity copper cables in his community alongside his friend Okemini Emmanuel.
The duo were apprehended by End Vandalism Taskforce Committee of metal scavengers association in the state otherwise referred to as scrap dealers and handed over to men of Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps in the state command for further investigations and prosecution.
Nwehihe explained that, “I learnt motor mechanics but don’t have money to buy working tools to be self-reliant. That is why I called my friend, Okemini Emmanuel who visited home and deals in scrap business in Anambra State to accompany me. We went there two nights to realize this quantity. When we went to sell it at Nwezenyi, we were caught. Please, we are sorry; we were just looking for means of survival.”
Recall that the State Commissioner of Primary and Secondary Education, Paul Nwobashi, had indicted metal scavengers in the state as being responsible for the high rate of vandalism of educational facilities in the state.
It was in a bid to prove the commissioner wrong that the association formed, “End vandalism” taskforce committee to end the ugly trend.
The chairman of the association, Eric Nwigwe said, “It came to our notice that there are two boys who vandalized government cables from transformers and high tension. We trailed them; when they went to sell the stolen copper cables to one of our members at his shop at Nwezenyi, we had to hold them. Upon our interrogation, they said the wires were gotten from the Okaria NKaleke community of Ebonyi LGA. So looking at what they got, we know that it is not individual property that they are cables, and only government owned cables and after our interview, we found out that they stole them.
“Real scrap dealers who are registered members don’t partake in vandalism, anybody who does it, does it outside the union’s notice, and once we see such persons, we will bring them to the notice of the appropriate agencies. And from the interview we carried out on them, they said they are from Anambra State, they are natives of Ebonyi State but they live in Anambra, they came down from Anambra to come and vandalize, carry and go, at times sell here or carry and go to Anambra. When that is done, it is the dealers of scrap here in Ebonyi State that are accused of vandalism. That is why we formed a taskforce committee to check the activities of vandals who always give us bad names.”
