THE Lagos State chapter of the Labour Party (LP) has accused the All Progressives Congress (APC) of sponsoring violence against its members in various areas of the state.
The state LP chairman, Kayode Salako, who made the allegation in a statement on Tuesday, December 6, said the APC in the state has adopted violence against its presidential candidate, Peter Obi, and his supporters.
“The Labour Party and Peter Obi’s Campaign Organisation are a democratic movement and no member should be molested,” he said.
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“It was getting clearer by the day that the APC had officially adopted violent attacks on LP’s presidential candidate support groups across the country.
“We find this trend quite unacceptable and condemn the growing violence by some APC in most of the states controlled by the party.”
Last weekend suspected armed thugs reportedly attacked some LP supporters who were holding a sensitisation rally in the Lakowe town of Lekki, Lagos.
The incident was said to have caused pandemonium in the area as residents scampered for safety, running for their lives.
One of the victims of the attack, Solomon Badeh, blamed the attack on some suspected political thugs sponsored by the APC.
“We were marching close to Lakowe junction when all of a sudden, a bus full of political thugs with all kinds of weapons stopped right in front of us and they started attacking us for no reason,” he said.
“It was as if they were waiting for us. Some of them had cutlasses and the majority of them had different objects like sticks and stones and they started attacking us and we all had to run for safety.”
Another victim of the attack, Oluwadare Bamidele, who is the LP organizing secretary in the Ibeju Lekki local government area, claimed that the attack was premeditated.
He said the attackers were waiting inside the bus at a corner around the junction and emerged from the bus when they saw them at the junction.
Oluwadare lamented the incessant attacks on members of the Labour Party by thugs allegedly sponsored by the APC in Ibeju Lekki.
“We are getting death threats and suffering almost daily attacks from APC thugs warning us to desist from holding walks or rallies for the Labour Party here. They claim that Ibeju-Lekki belongs to the APC but this is not the case.
“They may be the party in power now, but Nigerians are fed up and want change. We are not going to stop until we get change,” he said.
He called on security agencies to protect members of the opposition in the state.
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