Unknown gunmen on Thursday assassinated a
lecturer in the Department of Accounting, University of Calabar, Dr. Emmanuel
Igbeng, by the entrance to his house in Calabar, Cross River State.
The incident, which happened at about
8.30pm at Asuquo Abasi Street, off Uwanse Lane in the Calabar-South of the
metropolis, has thrown the university community into mourning.
This is coming barely one week after Igbeng
was awarded his PhD degree at the 30th convocation ceremony of UNICAL.
An eyewitness, Magdalene Bassey, said the
incident happened within split seconds as three gunmen came out from a waiting
car while one of them shot the lecturer on his neck at close range.
She said, “They did not ask him any
question, neither did they steal anything from his car. They just came and shot
him in the neck before retreating to their waiting vehicle. They were three in
number.”
Bassey said that Igbeng and a lady who was
in the car with him were rushed to a nearby clinic where the lecturer was
confirmed dead, but the lady was still alive.
Public Relations Officer of UNICAL, Mr.
Effiong Eyo, described the murder as a shocking development, adding that it was
sad losing a lecturer, let alone a young man.
“This is a great loss to us as an
institution. This man struggled and just last Saturday he got his PhD degree.
It is really sad for an institution to lose a man like that,” he said.
Meanwhile the kidnappers of a lecturer in
the Department of Zoology, University of Calabar, Prof. Edet Ekpenyong, have
made N2bn demand as ransom on first contact with the family.
Ekpenyong was kidnapped in the early hours
of March 10, 2017 while on his morning routine jogging exercise on campus.
According to a source, the kidnappers did
not open contact with the family until after four days after when they demanded
for N2bn as ransom.
The source told Southern City News on
Friday that further negotiations dropped the ransom to N1bn, N200m and N50m
respectively.
“At least three persons have been arrested
in connection with the kidnap. We are making progress and we hope that the
professor will soon regain freedom. They initially demanded N2bn but later
dropped it to N1bn. Just on Thursday, a negotiation was reached but in the
early hours of Friday, I learnt that the amount has dropped to N50m,” he said.
It was learnt that the university security
agency is working with the police to ensure the safe release of the abducted
don.
Speaking on the assassination of the
lecturer, the state Commissioner of Police, Mr. Hafiz Inuwa, said
investigations revealed that the gunmen hanged around the lecturer’s gate
before his return.
He said, “I am aware of the killing and the
police got there in good time. From the reports we got, the robbers were
hanging around and opened fire on him immediately he came. The street, from
what we discovered, was a lonely one. We have started investigation into the
matter.”
On the kidnapped university don, Inuwa
simply said, “We are making headway.”
Punch