By Abel Ishola |
The Kogi State Chapter of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) has alleged that its legal team inspecting the election materials at the office of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), was attacked by some policemen and thugs.
The SDP in a statement signed by the Spokesman, Muri-Sam Campaign Council, Faruk Adejoh-Audu, alleged that the state police commissioner was privy to the plans to lay ambush on its team.
It reads, “Information just reaching us indicates that the thoroughly compromised Commissioner of Police in Kogi State, Mr Bethrand Unuoha has deployed some policemen and thugs to lay ambush to and attack lawyers, forensic experts of the Social Democratic Party ( SDP) and INEC officers who are at the moment in INEC office Lokoja inspecting documents and materials used for the November 11 in compliance with an order of the Kogi State Governorship Elections Tribunal. The police commissioner, who was privy to the orchestrated insurrection in INEC Office by thugs of Yahaya Bello Wednesday morning, was forced to disperse the thugs after a directive from Abuja following a public outcry against the brazen attempt to use violence to truncate the judicial process. But unhappy that he was compelled to disperse the mob of thugs who were working in his partisan interest, Unuoha has contrived a backup plan to ambush SDP lawyers and forensic analysts and the INEC personnel who are expected to evacuate the sensitive materials in INEC to Abuja due to the insecurity of Kogi State.
“We are informed that the rogue police team in mufti operating with the thugs is in about five unmarked Toyota Sienna buses and is covering every exit route out of INEC. They have been detailed to trail our team and INEC personnel and shoot at their convoys. This plot is to provide an excuse for INEC collaborators of Mr Bello to claim that the sensitive documents and materials imperative to the prosecution of the SDP petition were lost to the attackers. The Kogi Governorship Elections Petitions Tribunal had on Saturday ordered INEC to allow the legal team of the SDP and its candidate to inspect the materials and documents used or emanating from the elections. This is the order Mr Onuoha has been procured by the Outlaw Governor of Kogi State Mr Yahaya Bello to truncate.
“We are crying out to the world to be informed that any attack on our advocates or INEC personnel or the INEC office leading to loss of documents and materials or resulting in human casualties or fatalities is orchestrated by the police commissioner, Mr Bethrand Unuoha who has reduced his esteemed office to operational headquarters of Bello’s thuggery activities. It will be recalled that this same police commissioner took credit for the cold-blooded murder of five persons including three serving police officers on November 8, just three days to the election, in an attack by a rogue force of policemen and thugs unleashed on the residence of our Campaign Director General, Ustaz Sheik Ibrahim. One police inspector Atabor was killed at the scene of the attack while two others, one of them Inspector Egbunu were taken alive and executed by Unuoha’s thugs in the bush while they were being taken to Lokoja.
“Same Bethrand Unuoha as police commissioner was first busted on Wednesday, October 18 ,2023, in the act of renting out policemen to participate in thuggery operations when a serving Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) was taken alive in a failed assassination attempt on our candidate and he voluntarily confessed in a now-viral video that he was detailed to follow the thugs by his superiors in the Kogi State Police Command. Before then we had repeatedly cried out against Mr Bethrand Unuoha using the cover of his office to aid and abet violence with a view to creating an atmosphere of fear and dread in the communities to cause voter’s apathy. It is on record that not a single member of the SDP has been arrested, implicated, or indicted in any acts of violence or thuggery all through the campaign or elections.
“But trigger-happy Mr Unuoha apparently working for Bello tried unsuccessfully to bait our supporters into violence and when that failed, he launched the attack which took the lives of three police personnel in cold blood. The two other persons killed in the attack were teenage nephews of Ustaz Sheik Ibrahim who were attacked and shot in their sleep. The public should hold the Nigerian Police responsible for any violent attacks leading to frustration with the judicial process. We raised alarm earlier that the insurrection thugs led by Mohammed Gegu, a thug and gunman who acts as PA to Bashir Gegu, Bello’s Aide were wearing SDP Tshirts and face caps printed for them by Bello’s crime organization otherwise referred to as the Kogi State Government.
“Mr Unuoha the chief police collaborator earlier today referred to Bello’s thugs whom he personally know and can identify (after working closely with them for over 4 months) as “SDP supporters” on protest. For the avoidance of doubt, there’s no single SDP member among the thugs hired by Bello and we challenge Unuoha to put down the insurrection with maximum force since he is claiming the thugs are SDP supporters. We challenge him to identify a single member of the SDP in the crowd of insurrectionists he participated in organizing. Isn’t it embarrassing to the police high command that again the military had to be drafted to chase away the thugs because Mr Bethrand Unuoha deliberately undermined the job of securing INEC for the thugs to gain control?
“We call on the Inspector General of Police, Mr Kayode Egbetokun to in the name of God take this policeman out of Kogi and save our people from deliberate state-orchestrated violence. Several of our people including his own policemen have died as a result of a series of violence ignited by this commissioner. Now that the elections are over, citizens of Kogi need security and liberty, but Onuoha as commissioner of police totally endangers these needs of the people.”
Efforts to get the reaction of the Kogi State Police Public Relations Officer, (PPRO), SP William Ovye Aya on the matter proved abortive as calls and text messages sent to his mobile phone were not responded to as at the time of filing this report.
