Social media critic hospitalised after flogging in Ebonyi

An Ebonyi-based social media critic, Oko Chukwu Obeni, on Sunday narrated how he was flogged by traditional ruling council of his community.

This was in accordance with the customs of the land after finding him guilty of disrespecting the community and tarnishing its image.

Midway into the flogging, his elder brother intervened by buying off 18 strokes of the canes with N9,500 as was the tradition of the community.

Obeni was said to have made some posts on his Facebook handle against some leaders of the community, which they considered slanderous and capable of jeopardising existing peace in the area.

The critic, who is hospitalised at Alex Ekwueme Federal University Teaching Hospital (AE-FUTHA), later apologised to the community over his action.

Narrating his ordeal, Obeni said: “I was called by one Julius Nyerere that I was invited to Essa Chairman’s House. I got to the place and saw Essa Executive seated and all the members of Isioru. They were treating a matter of somebody who fought them, so I waited till they finished the matter.

“They called me out when they finished. They forced me to lie down and face the ground. After, the Essa chairman Omezue Godwin Elekwa asked me to sit up and come closer.

“He asked Amadi Julius Nyerere to brief them about me and he briefed them, telling them that I am posting something against leaders of our community on Facebook,” he said.

But the community justified their action saying the victim desecrated its authority, by insulting leaders and defaming them in his Facebook posts, thereby creating insecurity in the community and portraying it in bad light.

Vice Chairman of the Essa ruling Council in the community, Chief Godffery Oko, said the posts by Obeni were false and threatened the peace of the community.

On his part, the Chairman of Isioru, Julius Amadi Nyerere, said the punishment meted to Obeni was age-long, stating: “Some of these punishments are being removed. For example, if it was in the old, the authority of the community in Amasiri which the Essa like this is representing, sometimes it is usually.

“But because of modernisation, these things are changed and you are just giving strokes of canes to reform you to desist from behaving the way you did. The Essa invited the guy to defend himself and he was found guilty and he was punished accordingly”.