A Punch reporter in Abia State, Ogbonnaya Ikokwu was on Friday attacked by the councillorship candidate of People’s Democratic Party at Amaekpu Item, Bende LGA Mr. Iheanacho Udensi.
The journalist was in the area to monitor the local government election which took place on Friday.
ABN TV gathered Ikokwu, had finished an interview session with some voters who were waiting for the arrival of Electoral material and ad-hoc staff of the Abia state independent Electoral Commission at 1:15pm when Udensi approached him with a gang of over ten men.
He had demanded the identity of the reporter and why he was in the area to interview the locals.
Not satisfied, he questions why was being led around by a candidate of another political party.
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The reporter told Udensi, that he was being guided around to see the process himself, adding that his interaction was only with the electorate and not with the candidate of any political party.
At that point, Udensi, ended the interaction with the Journalist and went physical and slapped the reporter.
Ikokwu, “I wasn’t expecting Udensi to attack me since we spoke in our local dialect and I had told him I hailed from a neighboring Local Government.
“But he slapped me on my left cheek and made an attempt to repeat same on the right side, but I waged his hand while telling him to calm down.
“He forcefully collected the mobile phone I was using for recording to the public outcry by locals against his actions.
“I still pleaded with him to release the phone to me adding that I was ready to interview him on the outcome of the election, but he threatened to deal with me if I didn’t go.
“At that point, I asked other indigenes of the community to lead me to the place of the traditional ruler to make a complaint, although he was not I was taken to president-general of the community Prince Gabriel Jonah, who promised to do justice to the matter.
“But returning to the village Udensi had been summoned by some elders of the community who condemned his actions and asked him to hand over the phone to me.
“He said he will only do that on the condition that I must delete all my recordings, but insisted that I will not do that since I interviewed electorates and not politicians, at that point, he handed over the phone to me with apologies and went away with his gang”.
