No fewer than 95 suspected cultists have been arrested by the Edo State Police Command following deadly clashes among members of the Maphites, Eiye, and Aiye confraternities.
Sunday PUNCH gathered that members of the three groups had, in the last two weeks, engaged in a supremacy battle, leading to killings, maiming, and the disruption of public peace.
The police said they conducted an operation targeted at the cultists, leading to the arrest of 95 suspects.
In a statement by the command spokesman, Moses Yamu, the police said 64 of the suspects had been remanded following their arraignment in court, while investigation continued on the remaining suspects.
Yamu said the arrested suspects belong to the Maphites, Eiye, and Aiye confraternities, battling for supremacy.
The statement read, ‘The Edo State Police Command has arrested 95 suspected cultists and recovered two locally made pistols, one single-barrel shotgun, and 24 live cartridges in sustained intelligence-driven raids of their enclaves in Benin and its environs over the past week’.
‘These suspects, who belong to the notorious Maphites, Eiye, and Aiye confraternities, were suspected to be responsible for the cult supremacy killings in the state’.
The Commissioner of Police, Monday Agbonika, advised parents and guardians to keep tabs on the activities of their wards to curb cultism.
