Uneasy calm now pervades the Bayelsa-Port Harcourt water routes with many riverine commuters now preferring to travel to Yenagoa from the Brass Island before proceeding by road to Port Harcourt following the continued disappearance of three youths from Oluasiri believed to have been kidnapped by yet to be identified gunmen along the waterways.
The missing youths whose names were given as Messrs Igbogimunapagamoye Yuosou (25), Eremiemi Akanate (26), Tekikumo Richard Isaiah, all indigenes of Oluasiri in the Nembe local government area of Bayelsa State were reportedly attacked by armed gunmen as they were traveling to Port Harcourt to repair some outboard engines along the Abonema-Buguma-Port Harcourt waterway about two weeks ago.
Lamenting the rising tension in the area leading to a sharp decline in number of the passengers now plying the route which is shorter instead of the labourious journey to Yenagoa by river before another tortuous trip by road to Port Harcourt, the lawmaker representing Nembe constituency III in the Bayelsa State House of assembly, Mr. Otobo Opusiri called on the Nigerian police to help unravel the perpetrators of the heinous crime and bring them to book.
Mr. Opusiri who visited the troubled enclave yesterday decried the present risk associated with movement of persons and goods in the area stressing that because of the continued disappearance of the youths believed to have been kidnapped by unidentified persons along the route people now find it difficult to travel through the route thereby depriving the boat operators their means of livelihood.
The waterways, he lamented are now unsafe for commuters and pleaded with the security agencies to beef up security in the area by intensifying their patrols to forestall subsequent occurrence of such ugly incident.
While calling on the government to provide police stations in the riverine enclave with patrol boats to enable its personnel to carry out crime surveillance activities along the waterways he cautioned the youths of the area to remain calm as the state government was handling the matter with all seriousness it deserves.