Date: 2014-06-19

Ordinarily, the Kwara PDP has resolved, out of respect for the humanity of the victims of the latest politics of hatred and intolerance, to close the chapter on the gruesome murder of one of our members in cold blood by APC sponsored hoodlums. But it has become imperative to dismantle the mountain of lies being built yet again by the APC and its sidekicks, around the gruesome murder of Mr. Tajudeen Eba, by suspected APC thugs, especially as exemplified in their latest press release, wherein they called for the arrest of our party leaders.

Thus, by way of further clarifications, we state unequivocally, that no "former senator" attended the Alore ceremony, where over 2000 APC members defected to the PDP. The highest ranking former political office holder that graced the event, and which was widely reported in the media, was a former Speaker of the Kwara State House of Assembly. We are therefore at a lost as to why the APC would blatantly lie that a purported "former Senator", who never attended the ceremony, would be said to have given cash handouts to the defectors, let alone to hoodlums!

However, what is not surprising is that this latest lie also fits into a long line of manipulative pattern of reportage of several killings that have occurred under the nose of the leaders of the APC in the state. Kwarans will not forget in a hurry how on Wednesday, 17th November, 2010, Friday, 27th May, 2011 and Wednesday, 16th October, 2013, over 42, 25 and 50 poor women and children respectively, who were scrambling for food, cash and other handouts, were reported to have died in separate stampedes that occurred in the house of a former Governor and self acclaimed leader of the APC in Kwara state.

But, instead of admitting the numbers of the dead that were widely and credibly reported by the media and eye-witnesses, the leaders of the APC cynically manipulated the tragedies by under-reporting the actual figure of the victims, thereby deceiving the grieving masses all in a bid to satisfy the bloodthirsty ego of their leader. This is why we are not surprised about this renewed attempt by the same leader to twist the facts of what actually transpired on Friday, 13th June, 2014.

It is a notorious fact that the APC leaders are the legendary purveyors of death in Kwara state. Over the years, they have presided over the killings of over 100 poor Kwarans through a humiliating politics by handouts and peanuts, from resources that actually belong to the people. Ironically, this oppressive regime has largely endured because of the endemic and humiliating poverty and the mob culture of violence that define the leaders of the APC in the state.

But, we had hoped that the APC will show some remorse about the humanity of the victims of their violence. We had wished that the APC would consider the loss of our illustrious sons and daughters and not descend to this new low of deliberate manipulation of the political circumstance that preceded the fracas. Must politics be played with so little respect for the sanctity of human lives? How does the leadership of the APC sleep comfortably with their conscience, considering the harvest of deaths on their head?

This harvest of deaths of poor people, including the latest, where unarmed decampees were attacked by thugs sponsored by the leadership of the APC, which apparently considered the defection of former APC members to PDP as a sacrilege, stains the hands of the APC. And the early the leadership of the Kwara APC comes to terms with the fact that the delusion of grandeur that drives their politics is no longer sustainable, the better for them.

We mourn the departed souls.

Rex K. Olawoye
Publicity Secretary, Kwara PDP