The Director of Communication for the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Faruk Adejoh-Audu has accused Kogi State Governor Yahaya Bello of the All Progressives Congress (APC) of orchestrating attacks on the SDP in an alleged attempt to undermine its chances of winning Saturday’s Gubernatorial election.
According to Adejoh-Audu, the SDP is confident in its position as the party to beat in the race, asserting its broad influence across all senatorial districts and claims that Governor Bello is resorting to violence and attempting to install a puppet governor due to the SDP’s unexpected popularity, especially in comparison to the APC.
Adejoh-Audu pointed out that Governor Bello’s focus on other candidates, such as Dino Melaye of the People’s Democratic Party, is a deliberate strategy to divert attention from the SDP’s strength before adding that individuals involved in the attacks have been identified, alleging that they were associated with Bello and accusing him of being the mastermind behind the violence.
He said, “The SDP is the party to beat in this race. Even the APC knows that it is an inferior party as far as the race is concerned. The SDP is the only party that cuts across the entire senatorial districts. We have confidence that we will win in all those districts.
“The emergence of the SDP has shocked them (the APC) to their spine. So, he (Governor Bello) believes he can install a puppet as governor.
“He knows that with the organic popularity of the SDP, it is not easy to achieve those feats. If not, you know Dino Melaye. He is a man hated by Bello.
“Why is he ignoring him? Who is the candidate of the PDP? That is because he knows that if he channels his energy towards Dino, the SDP will sweep the victory.
“Secondly, we identified the people who participated in the violence. For instance, our office that was burnt down, the person who led that operation is a full-time thug in Lokoja.
“We now know who is attacking us. Bello has been the one sending people to attack us. We try as much as possible to say it is Bello and not the APC because he is the APC. Our candidate left the APC; so, we know them.”
In response, the APC Publicity Secretary, Usman Suleman denied the allegations and emphasized Governor Bello’s commitment to peace and accused the SDP of engaging in attacks while expressing confidence in the APC’s victory in the election and assured that efforts were being made to reconcile any internal conflicts within the party to secure a convincing win.
Join our twitter community :