- Safiu Kehinde
The national leadership of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) has charged the Inspector General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, to hold the Osun state Chapter leaders of the All Progressive Congress (APC) responsible for the violence and killings in the state.
Reacting to the ongoing crisis in the state, the PDP in a statement issued on Monday by its National Publicity Secretary, Debo Ologunagba called for the IGP’s intervention over the killing.
“Our Party strongly condemns the violence and killing of some youths today by APC thugs and calls on the Inspector General of Police to hold APC leaders in Osun State responsible and bring them to book for this heinous crime.” PDP said.
The party also cautioned the sacked APC local government chairmen and councillors to perish the thought of forcing themselves back into office as such will amount to a futile venture with dire consequences.
While charging the APC to accept the reality and end its resort to self-help, misrepresentations, and vituperations, the PDP asserts that the fate of the ousted LG chairmen and councillors is irreversible, stressing that the opposition party is the architect of its misfortune.
“… the fate of the ousted Local Government Chairmen and Councilors was sealed by the Judgment of the Court to Appeal which nullified the unconstitutional attempt by the then Governor Gboyega Oyetola to illegally plant them as Local Government officers in the guise of an election.
“Having been roundly rejected by the people of Osun State in the Saturday, July 16, 2022, governorship election, the then Governor Oyetola and the APC ought to have known that attempting to side-step the laws and manipulate the process to illegally foist APC members and apologists as Local Government Chairmen and Counselors was an exercise in futility which was bound to fail ultimately.
“The APC is the architect of its misfortune. It should have known that disregarding and refusing to comply with the provisions of the Constitution and the Osun State Local Government Election Laws with respect to the requirement on notices, processes and procedures of conducting local government election is destined to be fatal and irreparable.” The statement read further.
PDP further charged the Osun APC to stop its attempt to drag President Bola Tinubu into the LG election case.
It urged the APC to rather prove its popular at the poll as scheduled by the Osun State Independent Electoral Commission (OSIEC).
“We counsel the Osun State APC to stop playing to the gallery by trying to bring in the exulted office of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria into disrepute by hopelessly dropping the President’s name at public spaces in their desperate but pathetic and unrealizable attempt to garner undeserved sympathy.
“The APC should note that our nation operates a federal system of government with clearly entrenched devolution of powers among the federating units as well as the various sub-national tiers of government. It should therefore desist from the fruitless attempt to drag President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and the Federal Government into the issue of local government election which, under the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended), is within the purview of the State and has no connection whatsoever with the Federal Government.
“If the APC believes that it is truly popular in Osun State as it claims, it should rather get ready for election as already scheduled by the Osun State Independent Electoral Commission (OSSIEC) instead of holding unto an imaginary strand of straw and instigating violence and killings in the State.
“The PDP calls on the people of Osun State to remain calm, law-abiding and get ready for the Local Government Election as they continue to support Governor Ademola Adeleke in his outstanding delivery of monumental life-enhancing projects and programs in the State.” PDP added.