Hoodlums on the night of Saturday, September 10, 2016 attacked and vandalized the campaign office of the factional gubernatorial candidate of the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, billionaire businessman, Jimoh Ibrahim.
The office is located along the busy Oyemakun Road in Akure, the state capital of Ondo.
An eyewitness account disclosed that some gunmen stormed the building at about 8:30 pm in a Toyota Bus branded with Eyitayo Jegede posters, went on rampage, destroyed and vandalised the newly installed PDP flags, the Nigeria National flag and the big billboard mounted on the top floor of the building.
The director of media and publicity of Ibrahim’s campaign, Yemi Akintomide described the act as barbaric, destructive and a very dangerous way of playing politics. Akintomide said this while conducting journalist round the building on Sunday.
Akintomide also said 18 poles with PDP flags, representing each of the eighteen council areas of the state and a Nigerian national coloured flag, just installed on Saturday morning, at the frontage of the campaign office by a governorship aspirant of the party, Bamiduro Dada, were all destroyed by the political thugs.
He said the hoodlums also pulled down and vandalised the campaign billboard of Ibrahim mounted on top of the storey-building.
However, nobody was attacked as the perpetrators of the dastardly act came in the night after the occupants of the office had left and the structure was under lock and key.
The publicity director urged stakeholders in the state, including political leaders, traditional rulers, youths, artisans, women and students to condemn this dangerous act “to forestall future occurrence of such action before, during and after the governorship election.”
“We are calling on our security agencies to come to our aide by fortifying security around the party secretariat and the campaign office, and all the people that will be visiting these buildings as the campaign hots up.
“We’re aware of the evil plans of the other faction of the PDP in the state as we go into the campaign proper; but we at the Prince Biyi Poroye led PDP in the state have been preaching peace and non-violence, leaving the court to do justice to the cases before it, while we continue politicking and preparing for the election.
“We condemn in it totality, this destructive attitude of our fellow party men at the other end, as we believe, as PDP members, we should jointly canvass for votes and mobilise our members towards achieving victory for our party in the coming poll, while the internal crisis can be amicably and lawfully resolved thereafter”, he concluded.
