Vigilance Group Kill 3 Cultists In Kwara

A vigilance group has killed three alleged
members of a cult group Aiye Confraternity
in Kwara State, after mistaking them for
robbers. Eighteen other members of the group have
been arrested by the police, while four got
critically injured. The Vigilance group had mounted some
road blocks around the meeting point of the
cultists, where initiation of new members
was being held. When the cult group finished the ceremony
of initiation, as they left the hidden venue,
they ran into road blocks of the armed
vigilance group. An exchange of gun fire
occurred. The State Command Police Public Relations
officer, PPRO, Olufemi Fabode, while
confirming the deaths and the arrests, said
the information gathered was that Saturday
night armed robbers were hiding in a bush
behind NASFAT village along Airport road, Ilorin. “This prompted various vigilance groups in
the communities around the place to mount
sentry on all roads that lead to the bush and
waited until early hours of Sunday morning
when members of the cult group completed
their initiation. “Unaware that ambush had been laid for
them, they ran into the ambush laid by the
various vigilance groups while people
mistook them for armed robbers and
opened fire on them,” Fabode said. The PPRO said in the ensuing exchange of
gun battle, three of the cult members fell
and they were almost burnt to ashes before
the men of the command got there. He also
said three of the cultists died, four critically
injured and 18 of them arrested and are being interrogated by the men of the state
CID. According to Fabode, some of the cultists
came from as far as Lagos, Osun, Ibadan
and Oro, adding that other cultists ran and
escaped when they learnt that their men
had been arrested by the police. He said investigation is on going while
corpses of those who died had been
deposited at the mortuary of the University
of Ilorin Teaching Hospital. He therefore admonished people “to always
give useful information to the Police with a
view to making the state crime- free and
warned parents to closely monitor their
wards as some of those arrested disclosed
that they were yet to gain admission to higher institution.” The dead and the injured were yet to be
identified.