Action Congress Slams Police Over Arrest Of Candidate

The Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) has condemned the arrest and detention at the police headquarters in Abuja of its governorship candidate in Benue, Prof. Torkuma Ugba, describing the action as a brazen act of victimisation.In a statement issued in Lagos on Tuesday by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party alsocondemned the action of the police in being so quick to act when a petition alleging the breach of peace and complicity inthe murder of Prof. Ugba’s aide, Charles Ayede, was submitted to the police by Gov. Gabriel Suswam of Benue state.”This is the same police force that has bluntly refused to act in all the complaints by Prof.

Ugba and the ACN in Benueagainst the killing, harassment and intimidation of the party’s members. It is now clear that IGP Hafiz Ringim is turningthe Nigeria Police to a highly-partisan force, which can only lead the security agency to perdition,” it said.

ACN said in what amounts to a clear case of turning victims to villains, Prof. Ugba, who reported the murder of his aideto the police, and the man who was in the same car in which Ayede was killed (Adaa Maagbe) – and who narrowlyescaped death himself – were arrested and detained over the same killing, just as some 15 young men in Ayede’s villagehave been herded into the gulag.

The party reminded the IG that Nigeria is in a democracy, where every action is guided by the rule of law and every Nigerianis guaranteed his right to associate freely under the Constitution.”It baffles us, as it should all right thinking people, why a police officer of the calibre of the IG cannot see the lack of fairnessin what the police is doing in Benue, where Gov. Suswam is hell bent on running ACN members out of town simply becausethe party has challenged his spurious victory in court.”Gov. Suswam said he won April’s governorship election in Benue.

The ACN is contesting the election through the appropriatelegal channel. But instead of waiting for the challenge to run its course, the governor, aided and abetted by a partisan police,decided to take the laws into his own hands, instigating the arrests, killing and maiming of opposition members.”Yet, the police boss pretends that all is well”.