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APC urges Buhari to probe alleged political killings in Rivers

By From Kelvin Ebiri, Port Harcourt
28 September 2015   |   4:35 am
THE All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers State has petitioned President Muhammadu Buhari, to urgently probe alleged murders in Rivers State linked to the 2015 polls.
Buhari

Buhari

THE All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers State has petitioned President Muhammadu Buhari, to urgently probe alleged murders in Rivers State linked to the 2015 polls.

In addition, the party has also urged the Presidency to cause the security agencies to probe alleged intimidation of the party’s witnesses at the State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Abuja due to security concerns.

The state APC Chairman, Dr. Davies Ikanya, said the party is making the appeal to President Buhari to fulfill his promise to Rivers people on 13th May, 2015, when he vowed to revisit the issue, vowing: “We will confront them with facts and figures. We will not forgive and we will not forget those who perpetrated killings and arson in Rivers State during the elections.”

He recalled that the immediate past governor of the state, Chibuike Amaechi, yielded to the people’s cry for justice by constituting the Professor Chidi Odinkalu commission of inquiry into the crimes committed before, during and after the elections.

But regrettably on assumption of office, his successor, Governor Nyesom Wike, whose party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has been accused by the APC of instigating the killings, sort a court order barring the Odinkalu Commission of Inquiry.

According to him, this action by the governor and the PDP denied the people justice.

Ikanya explained that nevertheless, the Odinkalu commission had earlier unraveled 97 cases of murder, 278 incidents of injured persons, 83 cases of total destruction of properties etc. This was gathered from the recorded testimonies of about 43 witnesses with written petitions, indicting PDP.

“We wish to lend our voice to the petition recently sent to our dear President and the security agencies by the Greater Together (New Media) Organisation titled, ‘the case of 97 murdered citizens of Rivers State: A call for justice and protection of lives of our tribunal witnesses,” he said.

Ikanya said that petition captured the threat and present insecurity in Rivers State and the lukewarm attitude of the government over this sad situation. He said the situation in the state gives cause for concern that in spite local and international condemnations that followed the elections in Rivers held on 28th March and 11th April, the security agencies refused to investigate, arrest or prosecute anyone for the murder and arson unleashed on innocent Nigerians, whose only offence was to belong to and support a political party of their choice, as enshrined in the Nigerian constitution.

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