IYC Mobilizer, Family Fault Detention Of Turner

By: Ariwera Ibibo-Howells, Yenagoa.

Erstwhile national director of mobilization and chairman action committee of the Ijaw Youth Council (IYC), comrade Wisdom Ikuli has called on the leadership of the IYC and other well-meaning individuals and groups to prevail on the authorities concerned to release the detained vice chairman of the IYC, central zone, comrade Amiebe Turner from prison custody.

The former national mobilization officer of the foremost youth body made this call Saturday in Yenagoa in a press conference he organized to further intimate the public of the unlawful and continuous incarceration of the IYC central zone vice chairman.

Ikuli described the continuous detention of the Youth leader at the Okaka prison, Yenagoa the Bayelsa State capital upon granting him bail by the Government authorities as inhumane and disturbing.

According to Ikuli after visiting Turner at the prison and seeing him in deteriorating health condition, there are palpable fears that the detainee whom he described as energetic and erudite makes him want to say that if nothing is done to free him his health might become worst, having spent no fewer than three months in prison without proper care and attention being given him.

Ikuli said though it is not unusual for people belonging to same organisation to have fracas, the reasons given for the arrest and incarceration of comrade Amiebe Turner were fabricated, saying even those who alleged Turner and other youth maim them and wreaked havoc on them have in turn testified that he is innocent of the accusations levelled against him by the complainant, the IYC central zone chairman, Tare Porri.

While reemphasizing that the Ijaw Youth Council as a youth organisation has a dispute resolution mechanism, he faulted Porri and others for taking the matter to court which resulted in the perennial incarceration of Turner, stressing that with his continuous detention he believes there are unseen forces perpetuating his ordeal in the prison.

While attempts at speaking with Tare Porri proofed abortive, Ikuli further said that in the recent past all formerly detained Bayelsa IYC members have come from one section of the state, noting that there are signs that youths from a particular extraction of the Ijaw nation are targets for arrest and intimidation by people who feel only them can call the shots in the Ijaw Youth Council, (IYC).

You would recall that comrade Amiebi Turner vice chairman, IYC central zone was whisked away by Government security agents and detained in the Okaka prison, Yenagoa on charges which some people who spoke to our medium on the condition of anonymity say were trumped up.

Meanwhile, Mr. Nimi Turner, elder brother to comrade Amiebi Turner has again pleaded with those concerned with his continuous incarceration to release him unconditionally even as his health deteriorates for prompt medical attention, saying his younger brother is innocent of the allegations leveled against him by those he described as his witch hunters.

Photo Caption: Inset: Middle, comrade Wisdom Ikuli flanked on the R and L by family members and friends of the detained IYC central zone Vice chairman, Amiebi Turner