The Publicity Secretary elected at the Ibadan convention of the Peoples Democratic Party, Ini Ememobong Essien, has blasted the police for dispersing PDP officials and journalists at the party’s national secretariat in Abuja. He recently urged President Bola Tinubu to call the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, to order.
Speaking to reporters after the incident involving the police, Essien said that several PDP governors were among those affected despite the fact that the police had earlier been briefed on the party’s concerns during a meeting between the national chairman and the Commissioner of Police.
According to him, he does not understand why the police allowed individuals who have already been expelled from the party to enter the premises, while preventing Governors and the National Chairman.
He stated that governors getting tear-gassed for no justifiable reason is highly unacceptable.
“You have been tear-gassed. All of us know the truth. Today, some governors have been tear-gassed — for what reason? Yesterday, the chairman of our party was in a meeting with the Commissioner of Police, and we clearly stated the issues. But this morning, they aided and abetted the entry of people who had been expelled from the party and then prevented the original owners of the party from coming in.
The true situation is that the police came in. We went in and met people who, immediately they saw that the owners of the party had come, excused themselves. The press was addressed by the national chairman, and we sat there.
While we were about leaving — and we had postponed the meeting we were supposed to hold on the basis of security — someone was escorted in. The same people who stopped us from coming in, who stopped two governors and the national chairman from coming in, were escorting someone. And so we remained here,” he said.
Read Also: Trump Shouldn’t Reduce Nigeria’s Complex Insecurity To A Religious Issue – Sowore
Essien further stressed that President Tinubu needs to curb Wike’s excesses to uphold Nigeria’s democratic record.
He concluded by saying that the FCT Minister must be cautioned by BAT as soon as possible for sanity to be restored.
“What we expect is the restoration of sanity. And we are calling on the president. History will record this. This is a president who led the opposition for so long, and never at any time was he treated like this. We are not asking him to help the opposition; we are simply asking him to remove his hands from the opposition.
This one human being has had problems with almost everyone. If you share the problems he has had with his fellow ministers. And if the president cannot call his minister to order, then history will record for him that he destroyed this republic,” he added.
