by Rachel Ogbu

Three people were left injured after armed robbers attacked the home of the Deputy National Chairman (South) of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) in Benin-City yesterday.

The night guard at Solomon Edebiri’s house and two others were reportedly wounded with a machete and left in a pool of blood when five bandits scaled the fence at about 2:15am as it was raining.

Edebiri who was also ANPP governorship candidate in the 2012 governorship election in Edo State was not home when the incident occurred but the robbers were said to have harassed his staff and relations yelling and threatening them to bring out the money at home.

According to reports, they used machete and bottles to inflict serious injuries on two persons in the uncompleted building inside the compound and started ransacking the entire building until they took to their heels when a mobile police man within the premise shot at them. There are indications that some of the robbers may have escaped with bullet wounds.

“I cannot place their reasons for coming because I don’t keep cash at home. The state of criminality has increased seriously in Benin and it is scary. I want to appeal to the police to do something seriously and urgently too,” Edebiri said.

“If we are not lucky those three people would have been killed. And we are still praying because they had deep cuts and are still critical in hospital. I will allow the police to do their investigation so as to ascertain their true motive”.