PHOTO- 19 Injured As Police & Traffic Officers Exchange Blows In Public

About 19 Traffic Marshals working for the Gombe State Government on Tuesday sustained various degrees of injuries in clashes with a group of policemen in the state.

Babaji Dunama, General Manager of the Gombe State Agency for Social Services and Other Related Matters, made the disclosure. He said that the clashes followed a disagreement
between the police and the marshals at the Cross Roundabout in Gombe Town.

Mr. Dunama alleged that the marshalswere attacked by the police while performing their duties and later eight vehicles filled with policemen went to his office at the Ministry of Youth and Poverty Alleviation and ransacked itwhile every marshal they saw there was beaten and 19 wounded marshals were arrested and taken to the police station.Mr. Dunama, however, said that after he reported the matter to the Commissioner of Police, Kudu Nma, the marshals were releasedon bail. The Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO) of the Gombe State Police Command, Fwaje Atajiri,said that two policemen from the Gombe Police Division were sent to invite some persons suspected of committing assault, when the

policemen tried to invite one of the suspects, he refused and an argument ensued between the suspect and the policemen and it was later
discovered that the suspect was a marshal but that he was not in uniform.

Mr. Atajiri said that the clash could not have occurred if the police had known that the suspect was a marshal.He however, denied allegations that policemen in eight vehicles went and beat many marshals in the Ministry of Youth and Poverty Alleviation.