Sit-at-home: Armed men storm Catholic church, disrupt morning mass

ONITSHA, Anambra – Armed men  suspected to be members of the outlawed Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB on Tuesday stormed  a Catholic Church in Onitsha and disrupted services .

Our reporter gathered that the gunmen  who  invaded the church during morning  mass queried the parish priest , why  he is celebrating mass when their leader Nnamudi Kanu was going to court.

A worshiper  in the church during the  invasion of the churche  said the young men who carried weapons including stick, planks and fuel invaded the church while the morning mass was in progress around 6am.

According to the worshiper, the  presiding priest shouldn’t have been celebrating   a mass on a day their leader was going to court. She said the  worshippers almost experienced a stampede as everyone headed for the door, in attempt to escape for their lives.

She stated that the  angry youths however engaged the priest, who was said to have used tact and  diplomacy to disarm them, causing them to calm down and  leave. We gathered that the suspected IPOB members also burnt a tricycle which they found on the road and beating the rider to a pulp.

 “This morning I went for the 5:30am morning mass in my church at St Theresa of Kalkuta Parish in Awada, it is close to Ukaegbu junction.

“We were half way into the mass when some group of boys suspected to be member of IPOB entered the church. They were carrying sticks and even fuel. They went straight to the alter and were almost half way there.

“They approached our parish priest, Rev Fr Joseph and asked him why he was celebrating mass on a day when their master was going to court. They were quite a number of them and were visibly angry and afraid . Everybody in the church took to their heels. There would have been a stampede because there were a lot of people in the mass today. I ran to a building close to the church.

“Father Joseph told them we were holding mass today to pray for the release of Nnamdi Kanu. He used diplomacy to talk to them, and even asked them if they were really for Ndi Igbo or Against Ndi Igbo? They now said okay, that if so, the people in the church were for them.

“They now called back everyone to continue the mass that they were now convinced that the church people were Biafrans. Some of us were so afraid that we could not return, so we went home from there. They apologized to the priest and left.

“The same group went out and saw a tricycle rider. No one knows why the man was outside because on sit at home days, you hardly find tricycle outside. They beat up the man and burnt his tricycle, and the tricycle is still there now smoking,” the source stated .