'Threats' Send Some Northerners Fleeing Niger Delta

Weekly Trust
22 October 2011

'Threats' Send Some Northerners Fleeing Niger Delta

Asaba — Solomon Chung, Abuja; Bashir Abdullahi, Port Harcourt; Eyo Charles, Calabar; Hope Abah, Yenagoa; Vincent Egunyanga, Benin & Monday Osayande, Asaba

The sack threat purportedly issued to northerners by a group known as the Egbesu Mightier Fraternity in the Niger-Delta is being taken seriously by many people.

Yet, there are others who believe the threats were a mere hoax similar to the ones they experienced several times in the past.

For the first set of people, the safest thing to do is to move northwards. But for the second, there is no cause for alarm and they are going on with their normal businesses.

It all started with purported poison pen letters circulated to leaders of Northern communities in parts of the South-south, asking them to leave the zone or get harmed in retaliation for the Boko Haram killings and the violence in Jos that affected people of the Niger Delta.