SHILLONG, DEC 9: The A’chik Matgrik Elite Force (AMEF), a breakaway faction of the Garo National Liberation Army (GNLA), chairman Sengjan N Arengh alias Spec (30), commander-in-chief Timudh D Marak alias Chijong (36) and seventeen years cadre old Pimp K Sangma on Wednesday surrendered long with arms before the Meghalaya police at the Meghalaya DGP Rajeev Mehta office in police headquarters.
According to them , the AMEF, which is now split into three faction groups, is having a strength of not more than 20 cadres.
They have also deposited one AK 47, one 9mm Beretta pistol, two AK magazines, two 9mm Beretta pistol magazines, one 36 HE grenade, two 9mm live rounds, sixty-nine rounds of 7.62mm, thirty-five live rounds of 303mm and six seals of AMEF.
“The three cadres of the AMEF have officially surrendered before the police and we have every hope that this will lead to more surrendering by the other cadres in the days to come,” Mehta told reporters.
Both the leaders, Sengjan and Timudh, have deserted the GNLA and joined the AMEF after they disagree with the ideals of the outfit.
While Sengjan, a graduate from Umshyrpi College, Shillong joined the GNLA only in 2013, Timudh, who is a school dropout, however was of 2011 batch. However, the 17-year-old cadre had never been to school.
Sengjan claimed he accidentally joined the GNLA through a friend, who was also arrested earlier last year by the police.
Speaking to reporters after the surrendering ceremony, AMEF leaders said, “The reasons for forming the AMEF was due to disagreement on the ideals of the parent outfit, the GNLA, whose top leaders are deviating from the issue of fighting for a separate Garoland but amassing wealth for themselves only.”
“Another reason that led to joining militant organization is because there are lots of corruption in the Garo hills region,” the AMEF chairman.
Though the AMEF’s ideology is for a separate Garoland, Sengjan, however, said, “But now that we have surrendered, we just want to leave everything behind for peace.”
When asked, the Commander-in-Chief, however, revealed that the AMEF is presently split into three factions due to desertion. “While one group has only 10 cadres, the other two factions are having six and two cadres with them,” he said.
He also revealed that the number of arms left with the other factions of the AMEF is one SLR, two 9mm, and five .32 pistols.
When asked, Timudh said, “We have not bought any new arms so far. The ones we have are those which we took from the GNLA when we deserted the outfit However, we don’t have any idea from where the GNLA had procured these arms.”
On enquiry of the financial position of the AMEF, the leader claimed that the funds collected are “donations on request”.
“At present the outfit is without funds because the money collected as donation was spend procuring of old pistol, shotguns and uniforms,” he said adding “Most of the “donations” comes from Garo businessman.”
He, however, claimed that outfit has never received donations from public representatives of the region.
When asked how can an outfit recruit a boy as a cadre, the commander-in-chief said that the boy was actually used as a worker for bringing food before but when police was misinformed that he works for the outfit, they decided to keep him.-By Our Reporter
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