BY AGNES NWORIE, ABAKALIKI
The Ebonyi State government has dismissed a viral video alleging that Governor David Umahi allegedly ordered soldiers to flog civil servants working at the state’s airport site for lateness to duty on Tuesday.
The allegation against the governor went viral in Abakaliki on Tuesday showing the governor watching the soldiers flog some people at the airport site.
Consequently, the People’s Democratic Party in the state condemned the action of the governor.
The party’s Publicity Secretary, Nwoba Chika, who made the condemnation on his official social media handle alleged that Umahi ordered that the gate of the airport be closed, while Umahi supervised the flogging of workers and civil servants when he arrived at the construction site at about 7:30 am
Chika said Umahi’s administration was becoming a junta of a regime.
But in a swift reaction, the Commissioner for Information and State Orientation, Uchenna Orji, called on members of the public to disregard the video, saying it was doctored footage.
The Commissioner said, “Our attention has been drawn to a doctored footage purporting to be civil servants rolling on the ground and being flogged by security personnel in the presence of the Governor of Ebonyi State while on inspection at the Government House gate, Abakaliki.
“We wish to inform members of the public that the purported footage is a video manipulation of an aborted attempt by miscreants to block the Airport gate and inflict fear on those working at the ongoing International Airport and possibly embarrass the Governor who was on a routine inspection visit to the Airport project, in guise that they were enforcing sit-at home- order at the premises of the Airport on Tuesday, 4th September, 2022.
“It would be recalled that miscreants had in the past tried to attack those working at the Airport site and their plots were neutralized
“Contrary to the fake report that the incident happened at the gate of the Government House in Abakaliki while the Governor was on supervision, the miscreants were dispelled at the gate of the new Airport under construction. It is to be noted that no civil servants or employees whatsoever have been recruited to work in the Airport and so no civil servant was flogged at the Airport gate, contrary to impression in the trending report. We are therefore surprised at the basis of the unintelligent fabrications of the mischief makers.
“There is no amount of blackmail that can distract the performing Governor of Ebonyi State, His Excellency, David Nweze Umahi who had visited the Airport to carry out his routine inspection of projects as regular inspection of projects is one the reasons why we pride with quality assurance in our policy of monitoring and evaluation in Government businesses. Members of the public are therefore enjoined to discountenance the manipulated trending video as the handiwork of enemies of progress.”
