Tag: Lai Mohammed

•Narrates ordeal in the hands of security agents

National Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Alhaji Lai Mohammed, declared  yesterday that his arrest in Osogbo on Friday in  Gestapo Style by hooded security agents was  for no reason than that  he belongs to the opposition.

He said his harassment demonstrates the level of illegality, lawlessness, anarchy and intolerance to which Nigeria has descended under the watch of President Goodluck Jonathan.  In a statement in Osogbo shortly after he was released, Alhaji Mohammed said he was arrested along with Mr. Sunday Dare, Media Aide to APC National Leader Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, and Mr. Afolabi Salisu, Deputy Chief of Staff to Gov. Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun State.

‘’We were being driven to the Government House when we were stopped at a military check point by men in military and DSS uniforms, all hooded and armed to the teeth with AK-47 assault rifles, pistols and other weapons. Since there was no curfew in Osun State and people were moving around freely, we felt it was a routine check.

‘’Suddenly, the men, some of them apparently drunk, ordered us out of the car, took our phones, pointed their assault rifles at our heads and said ‘you are under arrest’. They herded us into their bus like animals and drove away. There is no doubt that they knew who we are because I introduced myself!

‘’From our encounter with our tormentors, there is also no doubt that these were not just soldiers and DSS officials, there were also ex-militants and thugs, all clad in military and DSS uniforms but apparently lacking in any training. We also witnessed how men in military and DSS uniform fired their guns at the gate leading to the residence of Senator Isiaka Adeleke to force it open!

‘’We asked them why we were being arrested, but they ignored our question as they drove for close to one hour before veering into a compound that turned out to be the offices of the DSS. There, we met people who had been previously arrested and stripped of their clothing, many of them bloodied from the beatings to which they must have been subjected.

‘’We were herded to one side as our tormentors marched around triumphantly, in what could well have been a scene from Ukraine.  We were waiting for our turn to be stripped of our apparels and taken along with those who were arrested earlier to the DSS cells when a man who is apparently a senior DSS official intervened and ordered our release. The men who arrested us, apparently unhappy at the order to set us free, rejected the order, until the man asserted his authority and even accompanied us to where we were arrested.

‘’Back there, we discovered that our driver has been badly beaten and even robbed of his personal belongings by the same security agents being paid by the taxpayers to protect the citizens, whose ranks have now been swelled, willingly, by thugs and ex-militants, armed and dressed in official uniforms by the PDP and sanctioned by the Jonathan-led Federal Government!

‘’This arrest is not about Lai Mohammed, Sunday Dare or Afolabi Salisu, whoever we may be, but about the constitutionally-guaranteed rights of Nigerians, ordinary Nigerians, to move around freely, associate with any party of their choice and express their opinions without being molested or arrested.

‘’The way and manner we were harassed, arrested and dehumanised on Friday night show that Nigerian citizens can no longer be sure that the security agents they encounter on the roads or anywhere else are well-trained and highly-disciplined men and women in the military, police, DSS and others that we used to know. What we have now are Jonathan’s soldiers, policemen and DSS officials who have since stopped working for the nation but are now the enforcement arm of the PDP.”

Alhaji Mohammed said  that even as he was putting down his own ordeal in writing  scores of other APC leaders and supporters were still being  harassed and arrested across Osun State especially in Ifelodun Local Government Ward 10, Atakumosa East Local Government and Ife East Local Government, Okerewe Wards 2 and 3.

‘’Our party, the APC, has no doubt whatsoever that the depravity being exhibited under President Jonathan’s watch, in the name of politics, has his imprimatur. We have no doubt that elections, which should be a celebration of democracy, have now been turned to war because of the desperation of President Jonathan to win re-election at all costs. We have no doubt that the anarchic Minister of State for Defence and Minister of Police Affairs, who are leading the ‘’troops’’ in Osun as they did in Ekiti, are taking their cue from President Jonathan,” he said.

He wondered why those Ministers could move around freely in Osun and elsewhere, while other Nigerians, irrespective of the party they belong to are denied the same right.

President Goodluck Jonathan should match with action his talk on free and fair elections, the All Progressives Congress (APC) has said.

The opposition party also said all the assurances so far given by the President have not translated into credible elections.

In a statement yesterday by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the APC urged the President to ensure that next year’s elections are not marred by the intimidation and harassment of opposition party members and supporters. There should also not be deliberate disenfranchisement of voters, which hallmarked the Anambra and Ekiti governorship elections, among others, the party added.

‘’On the same day the President’s latest assurances of a free, fair, credible and transparent elections in 2015 were being reported, agents of the Jonathan-led federal government were ransacking the offices of a company hired to carry out an opinion poll for Osun State ahead of the August 9 gubernatorial election.

‘’If the opposition can no longer freely carry out opinion polls, if the companies hired to carry out such polls are harassed and intimidated by SSS officials as they did to tnsrms, the offices of which were searched for six hours, after which top officials of the firm were dragged to the SSS offices in Shangisha and computers carted away, then, how can any President convince anyone that free and fair elections can be held under his watch?

‘’If the Ngozi Okonjo Iweala-linked NOI polling firm has never been harassed for its choreographed opinion polls that favour the Jonathan Administration, why should other firms be subjected to the kind of Gestapo- tactics that tnsrms was exposed to? This is why we are asking President Jonathan to walk the talk,’’ the APC said.

The party said the foundation was being laid to “rig at source” next month’s governorship election in Osun at source, claiming INEC had been frustrating attempts by APC members to obtain their Permanent Voter Cards. The PDP, it alleged, continued to boast that it would use the military to illegally shut down Osun State and bully the opposition as it did in Ekiti.

It also wondered whether INEC Chairman Attahiru Jega properly weighed the statement he made, in which he tried to justify the deployment of troops in Ekiti for the election on the basis that they helped to ensure a violence-free exercise.

‘’Jega should be asked to explain why troops sent to provide security for the Ekiti election were harassing and intimidating only the opposition? Why were they arresting only opposition members? Is that also part of providing security for an election? If soldiers had only provided non-intrusive security for the election, perhaps no one would have complained. But where they turned themselves into the enforcement arm of the ruling party, everyone, including INEC, should be concerned,’’ the APC said.

The party urged President Jonathan to refrain from deploying the military for election purposes and read the riot act to his cabinet members, such as Musiliu Obanikoro and Abduljelili Adesiyan, and party officials who specialise in electoral malfeasance, and elections will start becoming free, fair, credible and transparent to such an extent that the world would notice.

‘’Saying one thing and doing the opposite, Mr. President, will not translate to credible elections. The world is watching,’’ it said.

As a starting point, the APC urged the President, if indeed he is committed to free and fair elections, to launch an inquiry into why the offices of the firm carrying out an opinion poll for Osun State were invaded and to tell Nigerians whether the firm would have been harassed if it had been hired by the PDP or its candidate for the August 9 election.