A day after the shocking killing of at least 10 people (eight engineers, a driver and a local woman) by the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF) wing a.k.a OLF-Shene in West Shoa of Oromia Regional State, local militia have killed at least four of the assailant gunmen, while the remaining are being tracked down, the Zonal Administrator confirmed to The Reporter.
Dirirsa Waquma, Chief Administrator of West Shoa Zone, told The Reporter that unknown number of gunmen – whom he associated with the outlaw OLF-Shene– ambushed government employees on Wednesday around 06:30 PM in Wolkitte Kebelle of Meta Woreda, where they gunned down 10 individuals.
According to Dirirsa, the deceased were sent by the Ethiopian Roads Authority (ERA) for maintenance work and included eight engineers, their driver and one local woman, who served the engineers coffee and tea.
The gunmen opened fire against the workers while the victims were on their way from a long day bridge maintenance work to their camps located in Ouro town, Dirirsa told The Reporter.
The victims were said to have been carrying out maintenance activities on a bridge that was first built two years ago across Urga River, which connects five woredas.
According to Dirirsa, a day after the tragic killings, local militia who responded to the attack took counter measures against the gunmen, and as of Thursday, four have been killed in Meta Robi Woreda.
He further said local security forces, which are mostly militia, have maximized their operation to capture or kill the remaining gunmen.
Nine of the bodies of the deceased were sent to St. Paul Hospital on Thursday afternoon for post mortem investigations.
On Thursday, The Reporter learnt that the Hospital was fully cordoned by Federal Police for an hour. On Friday, the bodies of the deceased were released to their families.
Despite repeated attempts to reach ERA’s Officials, The Reporter’s attempts went unanswered.
It is to be recalled that on May 6, 2021, the House of Peoples’ Representatives (HPR) approved a decision from the Council of Ministers (CoM) to designate the Shene and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) as terrorist organizations.
