Four Suspected Cultists Arrested for Beheading ABSU Students in Brutal Attack
After months of investigation, operatives of the Department of State Services (DSS) arrested four members of a suspected cult group responsible for the gruesome murder and beheading of three students from Abia State University (ABSU), Uturu. The horrific incident, which took place on March 12, 2016, shocked the university community and the entire state.
The suspects — Chikezie MacDonald (alias “Walking Dutch”, 22), Chidozie Obi (“Small Boy”, 21), Chukwuemeka Awom (“Archangel”, 25), and Chigozie Francis Eberendu (“Star Boy”, 23) — were paraded by the DSS in Umuahia on Thursday, June 2 2016.
According to the Abia State Director of DSS, Mr. Korede Kamoju, the suspects were members of a notorious cult group known as Burkina Faso, and they planned and carried out the deadly operation at Chido Lodge, ABSU, where the victims resided.
The victims — identified as Ebuka Nwaigbo and Samuel Ethelbert Chuka, members of a rival cult group known as Maphite — were beheaded and their severed heads mounted like goalposts outside the university gate. A third victim, Isaac Chigozirim of the Vikings confraternity, was shot during the attack and later died in the hospital on March 18.
The DSS revealed that the attack was premeditated, with MacDonald, the alleged leader of the Burkina Faso cult group in Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike (MOUAU), supplying the firearms used.
The incident adds to a worrying rise in cult-related violence, with at least 19 people reported dead in similar clashes in Rivers State within the same period. The arrested cultists were presented to the Abia State Governor, Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu, as part of efforts to clamp down on cultism across the region.
The victims