A battle between two cult groups of the University of Calabar is taken over by several other youth gangs who visit mayhem on the Cross River capital city for four days
By Emmanuel Una/Calabar
For four days, in mid October, cult gangs held Calabar hostage, spreading fear and mayhem across the city. With impunity, they went from street to street in broad daylight, inflicting pain and causing extensive damage to many structures in the serene city. The police appeared ill-prepared or incapable of containing the agents of darkness, who operated without hindrance.
The conflict which started on the University of Calabar campus between the youngest group of the Viking Confraternity known as the Skyloos and the Black Axe, spread to the entire Calabar, rupturing the city’s famed peace and serenity.
Investigation by this magazine revealed that some members of the Black Axe, a splinter of the Pyrates Confraternity, had on the 12 October, upon completing their final degree examinations proceeded to The Hermit, a notorious hard drugs and cult joint on Ebito Street, to celebrate what one of them called “our having successfully completed our courses and programmes against all the odds”. At the joint, the celebration ended in battle as they met some members of the Skyloo group who, after hours of frolicking at the place were high on drugs and drinks were seeking an opportunity to demonstrate their strength. The fight which lasted for over two hours left one member of the Black Axe dead and several other combatants wounded. Extensine damage was also done to property of the pub.
Outnumbered and outgunned by the Skyloos, the Black Axe retreated, regrouped at another secret spot and came back on motorbikes with more men and firepower. They however, met an empty bar, as the Skyloos had gone away to celebrate their victory over the Black Axe, which on several past occasions had won such combats.
In their quest for vengeance, the Black Axe held the entire Ebito Street hostage all through the night. “Our street was like a war zone. They moved from house to house terrorising people with guns and machetes. In their drunken state it never occurred to them that one of their back street rules states that after attack, they should retreat as farther away as possible,” Winston Uwem, a resident of the street told TheNEWS.
Meanwhile, some of the Skyloos, according to sources, left to places like Aba, in Abia State, and some to Ugep in the central district of Cross River State, to get as far away from the conflict zone as they can. Not content with the mayhem caused the previous night, in the morning, the cultists descended on the streets of Calabar attacking people who ordinarily had nothing to do with secret societies. Cars were damaged, shops looted and girls raped. When it became apparent that the police were incapable of confronting the cultists, other criminal groups, mostly youth gangs, saw it as an opportunity to engage in criminal acts. Such groups included the Bay Side Boys whose territory is around the Calabar Beach and the Utak Udara Boys who operate in the Calabar South Area. The Iddy Boys, another group, sacked casual workers of Orascom, an Egyptian firm constructing the Unicem factory at Anineje, in Akamkpa Local Government Area.
The armed youths split into groups and attacked one street after another. They ransacked homes, looted shops and destroyed the windshield of cars. “The police were nowhere to be seen whenever the boys came. But after they had gone, the police would arrive and cart people into their vans and drive away. We had the impression that the police were either working in cahoots with the boys or were afraid of them. Up till now, there is no report of where the police had an open confrontation with the boys,” Edem Samuel, a resident of Chamly Street, declared.
Last week, however, the police, as if woken from a slumber, went after the cultists. The Police Public Relations Officer of the Cross River Police Command, ASP Thomas Okpene, told TheNEWS that 27 of them had been arrested. He said he would not give their names and the gangs they belonged to, so as not to “jeopardise police investigations. These people are connected and we have to be careful as we want to get to the root of the violence so that we can prevent future occurrence”.
Though relative peace has returned to Calabar, people going about their businesses are still edgy. With the Yuletide season and the Obudu International Mountain Race fast approaching, Governor Liyel Imoke has mandated the police to ensure that peace prevails in all parts of the state.
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