The police in Imo State, on Sunday, arrested Rochas Okorocha, a former governor of the state, after a fracas over the sealing of a hotel belonging to Okorocha’s wife by the state government.
A photo being circulated on WhatsApp showed the former governor sitting along a corridor of a building that looks like a police station.
Okorocha’s aide, Ebere Nzewuji, confirmed that the former governor has been arrested and is detained at the police headquarters in Owerri.
Nzewuji said:
He has been arrested by the police on the orders of the governor.
The police are telling him that he is under arrest. It is so clear now that he is being arrested. And he is being detained.
Okorocha, a serving senator, is accused of forcefully unsealing his wife’s hotel, Royal Spring Palm Hotel, Owerri, which was sealed two days ago by the commissioner for lands and physical planning on behalf of the Imo State Government.
The commissioner said the hotel was built, without permission, on the government land. But Nzewuji, denied that the senator tried to unseal the property.
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The aide said:
When he arrived at the premises, they were confronted with thugs who had guns and machetes, and they were attacking him and his entourage.
He (Okorocha) can’t go there to make trouble, he went to ask questions. A staff member was beaten up, even the hotel’s guests still had their property inside the hotel.
He wasn’t going to unseal the property.
Okorocha’s spokesperson, Sam Onwuemeodo, later issued a statement on the incident, saying Governor Hope Uzodinma’s aide on special duties, Chinasa Nwaneri, led the thugs that they claimed attacked the senator and his entourage.
He said the governor’s aide was backed by the police in the state.
Since he left office as governor in 2019, Okorocha has been having a political battle with his successor, Governor, Hope Uzodinma.
Both men are members of Nigeria’s ruling party, the All Progressives Congress (APC).
