Oil workers accuse naval officer of brutality in Aba …He forced us to drink mud water –Victims

Workers of an indigenous oil company, Stock Gap Fuels Limited, which is constructing a mega filling station in Aba, Abia State have alleged that the Commanding Officer (CO) of the Nigerian Navy Finance and Logistics College (NNFLC), Owerrinta near Aba, Navy Captain Simon Ejaro, ordered his men to brutalize them at the site.
According to the workers, 15 of them, who were involved in the construc-tion of the filling station, were forced to lie down inside mud water and drink it by Naval ratings allegedly acting on the or¬ders of their boss.
But Ejaro, whose official residence is beside the structure under construction on Elizabeth Avenue by Aba-Owerri Road, has denied the allegation.
An engineer with the company that is constructing the petrol station, Mr. Opara told Daily Sun that on Tuesday afternoon last week, he received information that about 12 naval men came to the site to maltreat his workers.
His words: “We all came to work on Tuesday morning and in the after¬noon, I left for the bank to withdraw money to pay the people, who sup¬plied us sand. It was while at the bank at about 2pm that I got a phone call that about 12 naval men were maltreating the workers at the site, that they were flogging them, asking them to lie in the mud. So, I quickly left the bank and when I got to the site, I saw 15 of my workers, including our secretary, who is a female inside the mud and the Navy people were matching on them and ordering them to drink the mud water and roll inside it.”
Opara stated that when he tried to approach the CO, who was at the site allegedly giving orders to his boys to know why the workers were being maltreated, the senior naval officer ordered him not to get close to him.
The engineer said act¬ing on the Co’s order that his boys should not allow him to get closer, the rat¬ings “chased me away and I had to call my office in Port Harcourt.”
Opara said he stood afar and watched the CO or¬dered his boys to use their bayonet to puncture the 40 tyres of four trucks of the company with 10 tyres each that were supplying them with sand.
Narrating her ordeal to Daily Sun, Juliet Enwere¬ji, the company’s secre-tary/store keeper, said she was eating during lunch time, when she heard the naval men, who inci¬dentally shared the same fence with the company, ordering workers at the site to come outside.