Ozo Igbonekwu Ogazimorah
Akunne Odonugwu Ogazimorah Lodge,
Amaigish Ward, Amani Village, Awhum, Udi Local Government Area, Enugu State 0803 3221 221

The Editor,
Sir,

RE-BREAKING: 3 SUSPECTED KIDNAPPERS ARRESTED, FEMALE VICTIM RESCUED IN ENUGU HOTEL

I am the Proprietor of the 14-room Burgeon Hills Hotel (the only hotel in Awhum), which has been in operation since November 2, 2004.

My attention has been drawn to a story entitled as above and carried on your platform which you have also circulated widely to the point of going viral.

It is most disappointing that such a news story in the present unnerving security situation in the country, can be made and sent out without any effort at reaching the hotel management or the owner who you already stated you knew as a former political office holder from the community. Consequently, you had allowed yourself and office to be misled into carrying a story which was half-baked and which suffers the debilitating defects of imbalance, as it was clear on its slant, and obviously designed to injure a long held reputation of person and business.

Before I get back to these, please be availed of the real story, verifiable from instituted and personal sources that will be mentioned presently.

The Story: KIDNAP INCIDENT IN AWHUM
In the morning of Tuesday, July 20, 2021, three young persons, a lady and two men, arrived at the reception of the rural but standard Burgeon Hills Hotel, Awhum, and requested a room space. They were told that Hotel policy forbade two men going into a hotel room with one lady. They stated that only one of them was staying with the lady. There was nothing to suspect that the lady was a kidnap victim. After checking them in, the other man left in the Bike that brought them, while the couple settled into their room.

They continued behaving as normal hotel guests in the intervening hours and days, requesting and paying for services rendered, until the evening of Thursday, July 22, when the lady receptionist who was drying clothes at the back of the building noticed that a lady in a room upstairs was trying to communicate with her through the window, by hand gestures. She paid close attention and observed that the girl, apparently in trouble was repeatedly ringing her fingers around her neck, which looked to the receptionist like she was saying that she was about to be killed by strangling. The Receptionist quickly stepped back and called the Hotel Caretaker, who was in Enugu. The Caretaker, who took off immediately, with some close friends, quickly called the Awhum Chief Security Officer, C.S.O. Mr. Ogbo Ikunecheanya Ajagu, a.k.a Ichaka, who quickly rallied some young men and arrived the scene. They smartly devised a way of entering the room by pretending to be serving a bottle of table water made up as demanded by the lady in the room.

When they entered, they demanded to search the room as the girl started screaming that she was actually a kidnap victim. They quickly overpowered the man, bound him hand and feet and took him down stairs. Soon, the Caretaker arrived the scene and joined in calling the 9th Mile Police Division.

Meanwhile, as they were interrogating the suspect and the lady, two young men accompanied by a man in police uniform arrived the hotel and were thought to be a police officer sent from 9th Mile. But immediately these arrivals saw what was happening, they tore through the stunned crowd and fled, leaving two brand new motorcycles. The youths and Hotel Staff gave a chase up to the Development Centre/High Court Gate, and lost hope as it was then very dark. But in successfully apprehending the man in police uniform, they discovered that all were accomplices.

Very early, in the morning of Friday, July 23, they called and informed me. I quickly alerted the Police Anti-Kidnapping Unit who demanded my presence in their office to present them with a clearer picture. As I was doing that, I called the Chairman of Enugu State Forest Guard, Retired DSS Director, Chief Matthew Obodoechi, who quickly dispatched a team of the Forest Guards to the scene. He also called and pressured the 9th Mile Police Division and secured the cooperation of the Divisional Crime Officer, who now mobilized and departed for the scene.

At the 9th Mile Police Station, the suspects, all from Udenu Local Government Area of Enugu State, made statements on caution and clearly stated that they lived at a ghetto called Oku Mmuo at 9th Mile, where they operated as snatchers of motor cycles, which they always sold at Obolo Afor. They also revealed that they had accomplices who snatch motor cycles at Obolo, which they sold at 9th Mile – a kind of criminal relay ring. They also stated that this incident was their ever first time of using the Hotel as they did not even know of the presence of such facility until the night preceding their arrival at the reception.

In her own statement, also under caution, the lady said that she was kidnapped in the evening of Monday, July 19, 2021, along with her boyfriend, on the Abor road (near a road construction site) as they were on their bike, but her boy friend managed to get away while the criminals took her along with the snatched bike into the bush. They moved out very early in the morning and arrived at the hotel. Her boyfriend had already reported the loss of his bike and her girlfriend to the police at 9th Mile. He also made a statement on caution.

At this point, the Police Anti-Kidnap team, on my ceaseless prompting, arrived 9th Mile to pick the suspects but the Division had concluded arrangements to transfer the suspects, first to the Police Headquarters. We all followed them to their final stop at the State CID.

Your sources, known to me, and whom you fell for, had three objectives as their mission.
First, by claiming that the criminals had been operating from the hotel and terrorizing the community, they wanted to use your medium to rubbish the image of the small Hotel and kill it as a business. Secondly, by claiming that it was the Community Vigilante which discovered the crime, they were nourishing a falsehood, as the crime was discovered by the management of the Hotel, which promptly reported the first ever development to the right security quarters, starting with the distress call to Mr. Ichaka who has considerable police connections.

They deceived you into giving credit to whom credit was not due. And lastly, they were acting to draw the anger of government against the small Hotel, to help them achieve the objective of hammering the business into the ground, if only it would feed their inglorious high crest of petty jealousies and archaic squabbles.

I am glad that my primary background is one of a trained and well practiced journalist, who also deeply understand black propaganda. I am also an Attorney at Law.

I therefore, implore you to quickly correct the very damaging impression you have been used to create of my little business and my person in the public sphere.

My further interests, on the event and the legal implications will be communicated to you soon.

Igbonekwu Ogazimorah

Igbonekwu Ogazimorah