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As APC, PDP Demand Cancellation of Election
- Safiu Kehinde
No fewer than 288 suspected armed political thugs were on Saturday arrested during Kano re-run election and by-election, the state’s Police Command confirms.
NPO Reported the invasion of polling units by the suspected political thugs during the Shanono/Bagwai State Constituency by-election and the Ghari Constituency rerun election.
Confirming the arrest of the command’s spokesperson, SP Abdullahi Haruna Kiyawa, said the suspects were apprehended with weapons, including a pump-action rifle, locally made guns, knives, and cutlasses.
Kiyawa said the arrests were part of efforts to ensure peaceful conduct of the elections, adding that investigations were ongoing and those found culpable would be prosecuted.
He reaffirmed the command’s commitment to maintaining law and order, warning that political thuggery and violence would not be condoned in the state.
As against the New Nigeria Peoples Party’s (NNPP) commendation of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the security operatives, the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) called for the cancellation of the election.
The APC, in a statement issued by its National Publicity Secretary, Felix Morka, cited the violence reported in some of the polling units as reason for its call for the cancellation.
Morka alleged that several voters in Shanono, Bagwai and Ghari fled their polling units as the armed political thugs disrupted the voting process.
“The APC calls on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to immediately cancel the by-elections for Shanono/Bagwai constituency and the Ghari constituency rerun election in Kano State due to widespread extreme violence and election disruption by armed thugs across several polling units,” the statement read in part.