Killing of security operatives: Don’t trigger repeat of Odi massacre, Dickson warns militants

Yenagoa —Bayelsa State governor, Mr Seriake
Dickson, yesterday, condemned the killing of
seven Naval and Joint Task Force code
named Operation Pulo Shield personnel, along
the creek of Nembe and Foropa community in
Southern Ijaw Local Government Areas of the
state respectively and other parts of the Niger
Delta region.
He said that the unwarranted attacks and
killings of the nation’s security personnel
were putting the state and the region in bad
light and setting a stage for a repeat of the
ugly incident that led to the 1999 Odi
massacre in Kolokuma/Opokuma area of the
state.
Dickson, in a statement by his Chief Press
Secretary, Daniel Iworiso-Markson, said that a
meeting of community leaders, elders and
other stakeholders would be summoned at a
date to be announced later as part of efforts
to check the trend with a view to improving
the security situation in the state.
Describing the killings as unfortunate, the
governor called on the perpetrators and their
collaborators to stop with immediate effect.
“Terrorism does not favour peace, neither can
democracy express itself through violence,”
he said.
Dickson stated that the killings were also
putting the innocent citizens in the state and
the Niger Delta region in danger.