The House of Representatives urged the Inspector General of the Police to direct the Commissioner of Police in Anambra to review the location of the police checkpoints in Ihiala Federal Constituency of the state.
This was sequel to a unanimous adoption of a motion by Rep. Ifanyi Momah (APGA-Anambra) at the plenary on Wednesday.
Moving the motion, Momah said that for over two years, military and police check points had been operational Onitsha-Owerri Expressway had been operational due to insecurity in the area.
According to him, road users have since been subjected to devastating, degrading and inhumane treatment by the security operatives manning the check points in that area.
“Being a major expressway, the negative impact of the military checkpoint has been grave on the community, as well as all road users,” he said.
The lawmaker said that the security checkpoints were located at the middle of the busiest road in the entire Local Government Area (LGA ), opposite Abbot Boys Secondary School Ihiala and opposite Ihiala Divisional Police Command.
According to him, headquarters of both institutions are located within the same axis, an area that ought not to be associated with a military checkpoint.
Momah said that it is popular knowledge that military checkpoints were to be stationed at border communities and not in the current location.
“Recall that on Saturday, May 2020, a police make shift road block was the cause of a fatal accident in Ihiala which led to the death of.a trailer driver and his conductor as well as over 10 bus passengers,” he said.
The house observed a minute silence for the souls of those that lost their lives in various accidents at the police and military check points along the Onitsha Owerri Expressway.
In his ruling, Speaker Femi Gbajabiamila mandated the Committee on Police Affairs and legislative compliance to ensure compliance.
Briefing newsmen after the plenary, Momah said that the most annoying aspect of the situation was that, the officers often run away after accidents instead of giving help to the victims.
He said that but for his intervention and those of other community leaders, youths in the constituency were so angry and were about to take laws into their hands.
He called for the relocation of the checkpoints to forestall further preventable loss of lives and property. (NAN)
