Opponents Of Anti-Tout Squad In Anambra Are Enemies Of Govt — State Director 

By Raymond Ozoji, Awka

Honourable Solomon Chukwuebuka Onwuemene, the State Director Anambra Anti-Touting Squad, has vehemently declared that any person or persons kicking against the operations of anti-tout squad is an enemy of the state government.

Onwuemene, who made this strong declarative statement at the headquarters of the Anambra State Vigilante Service Lion Building Awka while speaking with NewsProbe, maintained that those embarking on emotional blackmail just to discredit the operations of the anti-tout squad were principals and sponsors of touts unleashing terror and mayhem on the citizenry.

He said no amount of blackmail would stop them from carrying out their lawful assignments of ridding Anambra State of touts, pointing out that the anti-tout squad would soon apprehend a certain activist in the state aiding and encouraging activities of touts and miscreants.

Onwuemene informed that the anti-tout squad sacrificed sleepless nights during the Yuletide to ensure that Anambra citizens had a peaceful Christmas and New Year celebration across the state.

He said that all the operatives of the anti-tout squad were stationed in all the nooks and crannies of the state especially at Upper Iweka in Onitsha, Okpoko, Head bridge, Oba and other areas considered as flashpoints.

According to him, Upper Iweka used to be a place where dead bodies of innocent citizens stabbed to death in the course of dragging their belongings with touts and miscreants littered but today, Onwuemene believes that such ugly episodes were no more because operatives of the anti-tout squad have rescued Onitsha and its environs from the menace of touts and hoodlums.

Onwuemene also disclosed that he has had meetings with park managers in the state where he instructed them to properly identify their workers by getting them uniforms branded in their company names together with identity cards so as to differentiate park workers from touts.

He said another section of the society he had meetings with were the Chairmen of Wheel Barrow Pushers Association in Anambra State where he equally insisted that wheel barrow pushers should be properly identified to forestall situations where some criminally-minded wheel barrow pushers absconded with goods belonging to people in the markets.

The Anambra Anti-Touting Squad leader stressed that another very pressing issue they would frontally tackle in the state was the issue of fake transporters collecting exorbitant fares from unsuspecting citizens at different locations.

He said from investigations, when such fake transporters collected money from passengers, they would disappear with it and the passengers would become stranded in the vehicle after waiting for many long hours without the driver and conductor in sight.

He said the fake transporters would collect N20,500.00 flat from 18 passengers and disappear with the money at Upper Iweka in Onitsha. Onwuemene noted that the touts were ab initio chased away from the streets and thereafter they re-grouped as fake transporters at Upper Iweka Onitsha siphoning citizens of their hard earned money.

He however assured Ndi-Anambra that there would be no more touts anywhere in the state because the anti-tout squad is winning the war against touts and vagabonds.