Controversy is now trailing the parade of two movie producers, Samuel Bobmanuel and Justice Nwiigbara as kidnappers by the Rivers State Police Command.
This is as Mr. Diepreye Precious, a lecturer at the Department of Theater Arts Federal College of Education Technical, Omoku has come forward to affirm that he gave the suspects, Samuel Bobmanuel and Justice Nwillgbara the wooden carved like guns to for their movie production.
The Lecturer said he also constructed the wooden guns by himself.
The theater arts lecturer maintained that the movie producers did not need any license from the Police to use the carved guns. He said they only needed their identification cards as Acting academia to identify them.
The lecturer who is a member of National Association of Theater Arts Practitioner of Nigeria and also their Technical personnel in Port Harcourt branch said he will stand by the movie producers.
It would be recalled that the Commissioner of Police CP Joseph Mukan had in a press briefing on Thursday said the duo of Samuel Bob Manuel from Oron in Akwa/Ibom and Justice NwiIIgbara from Baani in Khana Rivers state were notorious kidnappers arrested by men of Anti-kidnapping unit, Miniokoro at Rumuosi when they were planning to embark on kidnap mission.
Speaking to newsmen, Mr Bobmanuel explained that the men of Anti-kidnapping unit of Miniokoro saw his colleague Nwiigbara at Rumuosi during stop and search and collected his handset.
Mr. Bobmanuel disclosed that the Police saw the picture of NwiIIgbara with carved wooden AK 47 riffle and started interrogating him.
The movie producer stated that his colleague told the Police he was into film production and they brought his colleague to their office, Lavanz Film Academy opposite whiz oil at Rumuosi.
According to Bobmanuel, the Police arrested him and took all the carved wooden guns they used in producing a recent film ‘Shooting Spree’.
He said, “I pleaded with them to allow me call my lecturer who own the carved wooden guns to bring the license but the Police refused and took me to a place where they snapped us with the carved wooden guns and throw us inside their cell’.
