The recent abduction and subsequent murder of Hon. Justice Azuka, a member of the Anambra State House of Assembly representing Onitsha North Constituency I, has cast a somber shadow over Anambra State. Azuka was kidnapped at gunpoint on December 24, 2024 along Ugwunaobankpa Road in Onitsha. After several agonising weeks for his family and friends, his decomposing body was discovered near the Second Niger Bridge on February 6, 2025. It is the second of such gruesome killings involving members of the State’s House of Assembly, as Hon. Okechukwu Okoye from Aguata Constituency was murdered under similar circumstances in 2022.
Those heinous acts are not isolated incidents in Anambra State, which has in recent time gained a disturbing notoriety as the South East’s bastion of crime and criminality. Once celebrated for its rich cultural heritage and economic vitality, Anambra State now grapples with a pervasive sense of violence, marked by kidnappings, assassinations, and general lawlessness. Like in the earlier days of Boko Haram in Nigeria’s North East, a large swath of the state, especially around Ihiala Local Government Area, has been under the control of criminals and residents of communities like Okija, Azia, Lilu and and many others in the area were so terrorised that they relocated outside their homelands. Several months thereafter, most of them have still not returned.
It is in this light that the state government’s decision to launch an initiative to arrest the ugly trend must be appreciated.
Governor Chukwuma Soludo, who has faced widespread blame for his obviously ineffective handling of the situation since his assumption of office, last month came up with a detailed response. The government enacted the Anambra Homeland Security Law 2025 and introduced: “Operation Udo Ga-Achi,” an initiative that aims to enhance community involvement in security and social re-engineering. As a specialised intervention force designed to complement regular policing efforts, its objectives include improving intelligence gathering, incentivising whistleblowers, facilitating rapid response in order to swiftly eliminate criminal elements across the State.
The government’s elaborate plan includes operating a command-and-control center that would integrate voice, video, and data for security management, and deployment of AI-powered surveillance cameras to cover communities throughout the state. It is also equipping the security personnel with advanced tools such as a state-of-the-art tracking system and walkie-talkies for real-time communication.
While many people in the state believe “Operation Udo Ga-Achi” signifies a robust commitment by the state government to restore peace and security and to foster a safer environment for residents and businesses, Prof. Obiora Okonkwo, a gubernatorial aspirant on the platform of the All Progressives Congress in Anambra State, has been vocal in his criticism of the initiative. In several statements credited to him, the business mogul and chairman of United Nigeria Airlines dismisses the governor’s efforts off-handedly, and insists that the new outfit was a mere political platform. In a recent interview with the Daily Sun, he describes the development thus: “It is obvious that what he has set up is not a security outfit but a political platform with full security apparatus…Soludo has simply unveiled an army of intimidation and occupation to run everyone out of town for his re-election.”
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It is difficult to believe than an aspirant to the state’s highest office could be so insensitive as to reduce the issue of the people’s security to mere partisan politics, or to consider his political interest above the security of the cirizenry. It is in the light of this baseless criticism that the scathing remark must be condemned. Does the billionaire businessman appreciate the enormity of the state of insecurity in his state and has he evaluated its impact on the social, political and cultural life of the people? Every discerning mind, especially those not blinded by selfish political interests, knows that these criminal activities have so disrupted the state’s social fabric, deterred investment, and discouraged visitors.
In recent times, many Anambra indigenes have been compelled to relocate significant ceremonies, such as marriages and burial ceremonies, to safer locations outside the state or even farther regions, seeking environments where guests can gather without apprehension. Traditional festivals, community gatherings, and other cultural events that once thrived have seen diminished participation or outright cancellations due to safety concerns. Not only do these acts dilute traditional practices, it has had profound cultural implications too numerous to mention. When one factors in the impact on the state’s economy and how businesses are forced to close or relocate due to threats and attacks, leading to job losses and decreased economic activities, the picture will look even more frightful.
The good news is that the positive impact of “Operation Udo Ga-Achi” is already being felt. In its first few weeks of operation, reports of criminals and their enablers being apprehended, and kidnappers’ hideouts being demolished, give a positive indication. Granted that it has faced its early challenges, examples being cases where innocent people were picked up but later released, a preponderance of public opinion in the state is optimistic that the free reign of criminals in the state is gradually coming to an end.
The state governments pledge to reward, on monthly basis, any Local Government Area that remains free of violent crimes with N10 million and ₦5 million for individuals or whistleblowers who provide information leading to the arrest of kidnappers and other criminals, has acted as a good incentive.
The fact that the ‘Soludo Solution’ will involve over 2,000 personnel drawn from the Nigerian Army, Police, Navy, and other security agencies, defeats Prof. Okonkwo’s argument that it will be comprised of elements that will be used to hunt down political opponents to the governor’s advantage. Needless to say, Okonkwo’s criticism is politically motivated, given his declared ambition to contest the governorship election against Soludo, but this attack on the state’s security policy is, to say the least, tactless, senseless and wrong-headed. It does his campaign no credit, neither does it bolster his political standing in any way. Rather, it projects him as someone who wants to feed fat, politically, on the miseries of the people.
In the fight against crime in Anambra State, there should be no place for self-serving comments from narrow-minded politicians.
He should spare a thought for the scores of innocent people routinely kidnapped for ransom or gruesomely killed these past years. He should consider the dozens of dead bodies randomly dumped by the roadsides or in the rivers by ritualists who are after ego. He should think of the damage done to society when innocent citizens go missing only for their mutilated bodies to be discovered after their organs have been harvested. Any effort to reduce the carnage as well as the growing army of lawless people who have turned Anambra into a state of anarchy should receive support from well-meaning indigenes of the state. It is uncharitable for Okonkwo, or anyone else, to reduce such an issue that involves lives and the livelihood of the people to unnecessary political brinkmanship.
. Ozoene is Editor-In-Chief of People & Politics.
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