Osun PDP raises alarm over plans to arrest state officials

…Calls on Tinubu, DSS, IGP to caution members of APC over open threats, harassment

…PDP’s allegation is baseless — Osun APC

By Ismail Azeez, Osogbo

The ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Osun State has called on President Bola Tinubu, Inspector General of Police and the Director General, Department of State Service to caution members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) over open threats and harassment of state officials.

The party in a statement signed by the PDP Chairman, Hon. Sunday Bisi said its security department had earlier gathered hints that more than 25 state officials have been listed for unofficial arrest and abduction by special security teams from Abuja.

Bisi accused the former Special Adviser to the immediate past Governor on Education, Mr Jamiu Olawumi for phoning some aides of Governor Ademola Adeleke threatening imminent arrest of Osun state officials.

He said, ‘’Olawuni in the phone call said he will make sure that he gets the Governor’s aides arrested just because of an altercation they had on a WhatsApp platform where the official was asking him (Olawumi) to give an account of how they managed the ministry of education when they were holding sway.

“Instead for Mr Olawumi to respond to the question, he placed a call to the official bragging that he will make sure he gets him arrested and that those who will effect the arrest will come from Abuja.”

Bisi said several other APC operatives have issued similar threats in recent days which confirms the internal reports PDP already have about an alleged hit team already assembled in Abuja to raid Osun state and arrest state officials.

”We gathered on good authority as early as last week that the team is billed to enter Osun in the new week. The listed officials are to be picked up without warrant of arrest and without any trace of their whereabouts.”

His sources, according to him, disclosed that the Governor’s Spokesperson, four special advisers, five party leaders and 15 other state officials were to be abducted by the Abuja team in what would amount to gross violation of the constitution and an open threat to the peace of Osun state.

“We are still analysing the threat when a top member of the opposition confirmed the threats first by the news story which confirmed that Oyetola family and camp have been cooking several petitions against Osun officials at the DSS office and secondly by open phone call.”

Hon. Bisi said the opposition plan was exposed on Thursday night as some members of the opposition APC in Osun  bragged that they were going to use federal might to victimise Osun government officials and some leaders of the ruling PDP.

“While we know for certain that  President Bola Ahmed Tinubu will not approve of such an evil plan, we are constrained to alert the public about the imminent threat to peace and stability of Osun state through nefarious activities of Mr Gboyega Oyetola and his faction of Osun state APC.”

He called on President Bola Tinubu to caution members of his party in Osun because PDP will not allow its members to be harassed or victimised in the state.

“We seek Mr President’s immediate intervention.

“We are making this appeal on the premise that any hooded security operation against Osun state and party officials will amount to direct violation of the constitution and the fundamental human rights of those officials. We will not succumb to such threats and intimidation.

“Our members and government will deploy all legal and constitutional measures to stop the planned violation of their rights. We will legally resist any plot to destabilise Osun state now under the well loved and performing Governor Ademola Adeleke,” the statement added.

Meanwhile, the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Osun has described the allegation of the state PDP of setting the security agencies against some of its political functionaries and chieftains as baseless.

The APC said the PDP’s allegation is a mere fabrication to avoid answering pertinent questions regarding the excessively insane contract procurement process supervised by the Senator Ademola Adeleke government.

Reacting to the development, the Osun State APC chairman, Sooko Tajudeen Lawal, in a statement issued by the party’s Director of Media and Information, Chief Kola Olabisi, over the weekend, stated that apprehension by the Osun PDP is part of the ploy to mystify the issue surrounding how the government of Osun recently awarded over N50bn road contracts to fertilizer distributors, cyber cafe operators and many cronies of the party with no technical and professional competence to execute road projects.

“The handlers of Senator Ademola Adeleke are just being clever by half. They are perplexed and afraid to intelligently respond to our party’s revelation on how friends, family members and cronies of the governor, with no experience in road construction, were gifted multi-billion road contracts,” Lawal submitted.

Lawal explained that if anything at all, perhaps it was the spirits of the over 30 members of the state APC members, who were slaughtered like rams by the PDP thugs in the last elections, that were causing them the sleepless nights.

Lawal disclosed that the efforts of the PDP to whip up unmerited sympathy from the innocent citizenry has fallen flat as the informed citizens of the state are more determined to know the details of the shoddy contract process leading to how Governor Adeleke and his companions awarded state contracts to the serving deputy speaker of the state House of Assembly, contrary to the provision of the rules guiding contract award.

“Was it the state APC that directed Governor Adeleke who doubles as the state Commissioner for Works, to award a kilometre of road for a whooping cost of N2.5 billion which is even higher than what is obtainable even in the riverine areas?

“The state leadership of the PDP should leave the APC out of the problems it might have created for itself because of political desperation. If some criminals among them, those who were involved in the maiming, killing and kidnapping of innocent members of our party, are being wanted by law enforcement agencies, the right thing for a law-abiding chairman to do is to direct the indicted members to answer the lawful summons of the security agencies, not teaching them to act fugitives as the mascot chairman of the PDP is currently doing.

“Osun PDP and its co-travellers are groping in the daylight because of the confusion their greed has imposed on the people of Osun,” Lawal stated.