Umahi asks Ebonyi officials to flog residents who appear in public without face masks

- Residents in Ebonyi state who fail to wear a face mask in public would be flogged

- Ebonyi state governor made the declaration at a stakeholder meeting on Wednesday, April 22 in Abakaliki, the state capital

- The governor directed local government chairmen to use their men to ensure compliance by flogging defaulters

Ebonyi state governor, Engr. Dave Umahi has asked local government officials to flog residents of the state who appear in public without wearing a face mask.

The governor gave the order at a stakeholder meeting on Wednesday, April 22 in Abakaliki, the state capital.

Governor Umahi said it is important for residents to use face masks to halt the spread of COVID-19 in Ebonyi, even as the state has not recorded any confirmed case of the virus.

His words: “Let me warn again that no face mask in Ebonyi state, no public movement.

“If you don’t have a face mask and you are out, I am directing the local government chairmen to use their men to inflict the minimum compliance which is the cane.

“No face mask, you will attract cane, it doesn’t matter who you are. If you are a big man and you are coming outside and you do not have a face mask, you will face trouble and the law is very clear about that.

“We have also emphasised, in fact, the General Officer Commanding (GOC) has also warned that the order of blocking must be maintained.

“The police must block the first point of the border, the army must give a safe distance and then block, then the other security agencies will now block and then after that, it is now the neighbourhood watch.”

Umahi was recently in the news after he barred two journalists from covering state functions for “writing bad reports about the state.”

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The governor during a state-wide live broadcast on Wednesday, April 22 had declared that the correspondents of the Sun newspapers, Chijioke Agwu and that of the Vanguard Peter Okutu, should stop covering the Government House's activities henceforth.

The Association of Ebonyi State Indigenes in Diaspora (AESID) condemned the action of the governor.

On Thursday, April 23, the chairman of AESID, Ambassador Pascal Oluchukwu, described the decision of the governor as dictatorial in a democratic system of government.

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