The governor disclosed this on Saturday at a meeting with the leaders of the Ebira Community in the state at the Cocoa Conference Hall of the Governor’s office, Alagbaka, Akure.
The Ondo State Governor, Rotimi Akeredolu, has warned Ebira community living in the state to flush out the criminals among them.
He urged them to join hands with the government in ridding the state of crime.
The governor disclosed this on Saturday at a meeting with the leaders of the Ebira Community in the state at the Cocoa Conference Hall of the Governor’s office, Alagbaka, Akure.
They were led by the Odeyani Anabira, Zubair Dan Musa and Alhaji Chief Abdulazeez Majeobaje.
Akeredolu said he summoned the leaders after some suspects arrested in connection to the June 5 terror attack at the St Francis Catholic church, Owo, were found to be Ebira.
The governor, who stressed that the Ebira people had lived together with the indigenes of the state for too long, charged them not to deviate from their farming trade.
The governor said, “We summoned this meeting with our brothers. They are not new here but because of the recent developments that have to do with the Owo massacre and kidnappings, we have to call ourselves. I can assure you all that we have had very frank discussion with ourselves and the leader of the Ebiras in Ondo State spoke on behalf of Ebiras and few other persons.
“It is clear that the message from us to them is well understood and we have assurance from the Ebiras who are living in Ondo State that they would corporate with the security agencies and that the incident in Owo was something that they themselves felt very bad about.
“I also have received a letter from Ohinoyi of Ebiraland; that is the leader of Ebira in the world, commiserating again and expressing his own embarrassment on what happened. So, we leave here today with the belief that our brothers, Ebira that are here, would at the least work to ensure that there is security in Ondo State and in doing that, we have charged them to discus with all their people.
“They have assured us they would do that and we want to call on our people that at least, let us continue with our brotherliness and maintain the good relationship we have had with them in the past. We believe that it is not those who are residing here that came to perpetrate this crime. That is what they have said and we should give them another chance.”