Politicians shocked by destruction in Odi

A Senate investigation committee entering the village of Odi in the Niger Delta for the first time since it was sealed off by troops some 11 days ago has expressed shock at the scale of destruction there.

"I am shocked," Senate president Chuba Okadigbo told reporters after his inspection on Monday.

The army moved in to arrest the killers of 12 policemen and to pacify the village. Media sources in Lagos told IRIN that reporters accompanying the Senate team said that virtually every building in Odi had been destroyed. It is unclear whether the army or the rampaging youths are responsible.

The Senate's committee is under a mandate to inquire into complaints by the ethnic Ijaw community that the army had killed dozens of residents since it entered Odi.

This was the first time outsiders had been allowed into the area since the army, under the direct control of Bayelsa State Governor Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, sealed off the village. Community leaders have appealed to the authorities for the return of thousands of people believed to have fled into the bush.

"The team only found women and children in Odi," a local media source told IRIN.

President Olusegun Obasanjo's spokesman, Doyin Okupe, said on Monday the soldiers had "clear, specific and unambiguous instructions: dislodge perpetrators of violence, restore law and order and apprehend suspected murderers".

Okupe was quoted by the BBC as saying that the soldiers were under strict instructions to avoid unnecessary deaths.