Ozubulu and the limit of internet abuse

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St. Philip’s Catholic Church, Ozubulu

Since the Ozubulu massacre which disrupted the peace of the rustic community and cast slur on the impeccable security profile of the Obiano government, another flank of attack has opened on the internet.For sure, a grotesquely odd incident that sent scores of innocent worshippers in the House of God to an early grave can never be muted in conversation. If nothing else, humanity was diminished by it and completely unhinged by the memory. May the souls of the unfortunate victims find repose in the bosom of the Lord!

However, it takes more than the unfair attack, as evident on the internet, to get to first base in fishing out the psychopathic malcontent who acted the “spaghetti western.” Rather than help the course of investigation, the attack will only stultify effort at unmasking the criminal. Granted that the incident was both shocking and unusual, the least it deserves is a clumsy debate on the matter. The official position of the state following from the preliminary investigation by the police cannot be caused to seem foolish by sustained attack on the net.

What the attacker has is mere snippet of information scavenged from discarded sources. Attempting to change the narrative on the strength of this and especially on an incident as devastating as mass murder in a church was most impertinent. Perhaps the time is now for the inveterate critic - who perched on every issue since the Obiano government – to spare on certain subjects. If the state which controls all the security apparatuses called what happened a spillover of a gang war outside of the country why should anybody insist otherwise and continue to misinform the public? Why impute the killing to either the Fulani nomads or the suicides of the Northeast? Even though there is nothing to be said in defence of both, are the latter not known to claim responsibility after every inglorious action? Or are there no survivors of the attack to counter the lone wolf account of the police and tell if the murderer(s) were the amorphous crowd of Fulani invaders?

It is amusing to read from the attacker that the governor is a friend of one of the guys alleged to be involved in the gang war. By implication the friendship compromised security in the peaceful community. When a journalist put the question to the governor after his broadcast to the state on the incident, he reminded his critic that he was elected the governor of everybody, including the good and the not-so-good. He was quick to reassure (having done so earlier at the scene of death) that the dastardly act will never happen again under his watch.

As encouraging as the assurance, the virulent critic was unimpressed. In a tone reminiscent of mischief he keeps portraying the attack as a clear case of insecurity in the state. Even as security does not mean an absence of crime he still would not budge. In his little world a one-off incident rather than routine occurrence qualifies to affix on a state a tag of insecurity.

He was loath to see that even countries failed to ward off similar aggressions in the past. For instance, as sophisticated as the United States of America, she could not prevent many a one-off attacks that almost crippled her. Two of them in recent past were devastating but couldn’t diminish her status as a secured state. The one was the bombing of Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building otherwise known as the Oklahoma City bombing. The terrorist in-chief, the accursed Timothy McVeigh, wasted a total of 168 lives in the mindless bombing. The Al Qaeda offensive of September 11, 2001 was no less devastating. The number of the dead were put at about 2, 996 people.

The effort of the state government to unmask the actor(s) in the bloody spaghetti western cannot be achieved through abuse on the alternate media. It takes supportive action and not abuse to bring the matter to a close. It might be argued that the shock of the gory incident would have instigated the attack on the net, but it is not enough to distort facts. What happened at Ozubulu cannot in any way be used as the yardstick to measure the security situation in Anambra. The Obiano government has done so much to bring security to the state and as such deserves some encouragement. Recall that it took the governor no time to arrive the scene and thereafter proceeded to the Teaching Hospital at Nnewi. He not only commiserated with the injured, but underwrote their bills.

It is not in the interest of the state to peddle falsehood on the internet just to score cheap political goal. That can diminish the state, the governor and the rest of us.

Just recently, an attack by hoodlums disguised as masqueraders who tried to snatch personal belongings of pedestrians on Oguta road, Onitsha, was caused to seem like another attack on the church. But far from that, no such thing happened. Not even the Assembly of God Church on that stretch of road was aware of the altercation. The misinformation was unnecessary. Anambra State is not under threat of invaders. The position of the state on the Ozubulu incident is tenable and shouldn’t be thwarted on the altar of politics. Anambra is peaceful and it takes the support of everybody to keep it so.
Anyaduba wrote from Abatete.