POLITICAL situations in Kwara State may have started assuming a dangerous dimension following the recent simultaneous destruction in Ilorin of strategically mounted billboards belonging to the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and the leading opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

  So serious is the development that leaders of the two parties have not just been complainants to the officers of the state’s Police command, but they are equally pointing accusing fingers at each other.

  At strategic locations like Gerin Alimi Round About, Challenge Junction, Offa Garage Terminus, Ibrahim Taiwo Road, and Fate Junction, all in Ilorin, the capital city and across some major towns in the state, the political billboards of the two parties had been defaced by yet to be apprehended persons.

  Already, the local chieftains of the APC and the PDP had held separate press conferences to condemn the act but with the belief that either of the parties was responsible for the ugly incidence.

   The Police spokesman in the state, Ajayi Okasanmi (DSP), said they would unravel those behind the vandalism and prosecute them “under the laws of the land.”

  According to the state Chairman of the APC, Ishola Balogun Fulani, alleged sponsored thugs of the PDP could not be divorced from the destruction of the billboards.

  Fulani said: “After the failed attempt to instigated the impeachment of the Governor of Kwara State, Alhaji Abdulfatah Ahmed, as the PDP did in Adamawa State, events in Kwara in the past few days point to a desperate attempt by the PDP and its sponsored political thugs to make the state ungovernable through PDP-instigated political unrest and crises.

  “Daunted and frightened by the rising popularity and acceptability of the APC and the APC-led performing government in Kwara State, as shown by Kwarans during recent town hall meetings, and the failure of its frivolous and inflammatory press statements to incite Kwarans against the government and the APC, the PDP, which is renowned for thuggery and gangsterism, has embarked on criminal activities.

  “The billboards, with inscription of APC logo and imprint of APC manifestos sponsored by APC members and erected at the frontage of their houses and junctions of their streets in Ilorin metropolis, have been massively destroyed by PDP thugs in a clear attempt to provoke retaliation from APC members in order to set the ground for its evil plot to burn Kwara State.”

  Fulani said while the APC has no issue of violence, the PDP has fertile record of violence, stressing that the PDP had been indicted in the fracas that occurred in state. 

  “It was PDP thugs that disrupted business activities and destroyed properties at Post Office, Taiwo Isale, Niger Road, Unity Road and other areas of the State on a Monday in protest to the failure of PDP leadership to fulfill promises made to the thugs that were mobilised to a PDP rally held a day earlier and attended by President Goodluck Jonathan,” he said. 

  “It was PDP that held bloody congresses in Kwara State that led to loss of lives while many were left brutally wounded. It was a PDP chieftain and member of Kwara State House of Assembly, and his son that were arrested with loads of ammunition. 

  “It was the clash of PDP thugs at PDP senatorial meeting at Oro Lodo primary school, Omu-Aran, recently that resulted into violence at the entire stretch of the area. 

  “It was PDP thugs that terrorised the whole city of Ilorin and murdered innocent Kwarans due to mere controversies on the sharing formula of a largesse given to them by a PDP chieftain. PDP has boundless affinity for brutality, bloodshed and violence. The list is endless.”

  Fulani warned that Kwarans had not heard the last of these criminal cases, urging the Police not to sweep these alleged pure criminal cases under the carpet, as “Kwarans deserve justice in the interest of peace in Kwara State.”

  He recalled that before alleged nocturnal and desperate politicians, who parade themselves as PDP leaders, started visiting Kwara State in preparation for 2015 elections, there was relative peace. 

  “Before the PDP gathered sworn enemies of Kwara State at Abuja to raise funds, thuggery was not well-funded,” he said, adding, “does it mean that the funds have been channeled to thuggery?”

  Fulani continued: “The frustration of the opposition PDP has led to declaration of war on the people of Kwara State. If this violent trend is not arrested, it is capable of turning the state into a war-ridden zone.

  “We have raised the alarm several times that the PDP is desperate to make Kwara State ungovernable and this evil plot constitutes a danger to our democracy and future. 

  “Today, we state that the PDP, with the full support of Abuja politicians, has perfected evil plans to burn Kwara State.”

  Nonetheless, he encouraged APC members to be peaceful in the face of ceaseless provocations and intimidations by alleged PDP thugs, “as the security agencies, funded by tax payers’ monies, are expected to swiftly arrest the ceaseless unfortunate bloody attacks on our party members.”

  “We warn the PDP, in as much as our party has never hidden our hatred for violence, there is no monopoly of violence,” he said.

  “We call on the Police Command to immediately arrest the PDP thugs and their leaders while introducing proactive measures to curtail further attacks by the PDP thugs on APC members and the good people of Kwara State. 

  “All security agencies are alerted on the criminal activities of the PDP in Kwara State.”

HOWEVER, the Publicity Secretary of the PDP in Kwara, Chief Rex Olawoye, described the APC allegation against as reckless, unfounded and baseless.

  Olawoye said: “This allegation is not only reckless and hasty, but clearly made in bad faith.

  “We make bold to say that this latest spate of violence is premeditated by the APC itself — it might be a prelude to the rain of violence that the ruling party and its government are planning to visit on PDP members across the state in the name of ‘revenge’. 

  “Or, how else do we describe a situation whereby the APC, without the benefit of a police investigation, let alone an arrest, would descend to the gutter level of alleging without proof? 

  “That the APC’s first port of call, in less than 24 hours to the occurrence of the alleged vandalism, is the media and not the police should naturally arose suspicion from all right-thinking members of the public. 

  “Why rush to the media when the police and other relevant security agencies have not commenced investigations, let alone make arrest? Is this a way of also pre-empting the outcome of police investigations?”

  Olawoye argued that the APC, “by this repulsive hype, has made itself the complainant, the jury and even the executioner! What can be more lawless than this?” 

  “This renewed APC manufactured violence has no doubt lent credence to talks on the street that the APC actually masterminded the vandalism in a desperate bid to divert people’s attention from the violence visited on the posters and billboards of the PDP and its chieftains on the eve of the Eid Fitr, which held recently.”

  Olawoye said a case in point was the alleged brazen vandalism of the posters and billboards of Mr. Dele Belgore (SAN), Alhaji Jani Ibrahim and Hajia Bilkisu Gambari, three prominent chieftains of the PDP “who deployed the billboards and handbills to felicitate with Kwarans on the celebration of the Eid.”

  “While some were outrightly shred to pieces by suspected APC thugs, others had the presidential campaign posters of Sen. Bukola Saraki super-imposed over them,” he said. 

  “Similar tactics were used by suspected APC hoodlums on the eve of the visit of President Goodluck Jonathan to Kwara for the Unity Rally, which led to the arrest of confessed APC thugs, who in turned led the police to the office of the printer that was hired by another SA to Governor Ahmed to print posters meant to be imposed on the PDP billboards. 

  “The latter scenario was widely reported and the APC has not had the courage to apologise.”

  Olawoye said instead of resorting to violence or make noise out of it, the PDP duly petitioned the Police Commissioner and asked him to investigate a serving Special Assistant (SA) to Governor Abdulfatah Ahmed, who was reportedly caught red-handed vandalising the billboards. 

  “The petition was dated 30th July, 2014, a copy of which was also forwarded to the Inspector General of Police (IGP),” he said.

  “And since we have been getting positive updates from the police, particularly the fact that the suspected SA had been invited for interrogations, we have no cause to take the laws into our hands. 

  “Instead of resorting to violence, we have sought protection under the law of the lands. We have also taken solace in the fact that the storm, the peril and the oppression that we are all suffering today in the hands of the APC and its thugs, will soon be over in less than eight months, which is the final exit date of the APC-led government in Kwara State.”

  Yet, he said a second and potent look at the situation might point to a deeper reflection of the internal crisis that is allegedly rocking the Kwara APC. 

  “It might be an open expression of frustration by APC members to the repression that they suffer in the hand of a single overlord, who is remote-controlling all of them in the party,” he said.

  Olawoye posed series of questions: “If the APC structure in Kwara is not in tatters, as being claimed, why then are some APC legislators in the Kwara State House of Assembly reportedly rooting for the impeachment of the governor? 

  “Why has the House leadership remained mute since the alleged impeachment move was blown by the media?

  “Could this latest violence therefore be a spontaneous reaction of supporters of Governor Abdulfatah Ahmed to the widely reported bid of his godfather, Sen. Bukola Saraki, to impeach the sitting governor? 

  “Could it be that the open frustrations displayed by APC members to the faces of the representatives of the APC during the controversial Town Hall Meeting in the Governor’s ancestral Igominaland of Oyun, Offa, Aje-Ipo and Omu-Aran, is now being taken a notch higher? 

  “Why are elders of the APC, led by Chief Emmanuel Sayomi from Irepodun LGA, openly rejecting the presidential bid of Sen. Bukola Saraki?”

  He said these are credible variables that may help the police unravel the mystery surrounding the alleged vandalism. 

  “And this is why we are asking the APC to honestly do a soul-searching, look within its folds to be able to identify the culprits,” he said.

  “But as credible as the variables, such violent conduct by APC members is nevertheless reprehensible and condemnable.   

  “This is why we agree with the APC that the vandalism be thoroughly investigated and perpetrators be brought to book in no time.”

  As the riddles continue and blames and counter-blames heighten, political analysts in the state have challenged the police to unravel those behind the vice.