Kogi PDP raises alarm over defector’s abduction

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Kogi State has raised the alarm over the abduction of a recent defector from the All Progressives Congress to the PDP.

The party explained that the defector, Mallam Ibrahim, was abducted at his residence at Treadmore Estate, Lugbe-Abuja road by gunmen outfitted in military camouflage and alleged to be led by one Naval officer, Charles, said to be working with a Special Navy Squad positioned at the residence of Governor Yahaya Bello in Okene.

The party, in a statement by the PDP Presidential Election Management Committee, signed by its Spokesperson, Faruk Adejoh-Audu, on October 25, 2022, noted that “the PDP Presidential Election State Management Committee condemns the act of intimidation and crude show of unrestrained power and demands that nothing whatsoever happens to Mallam Ibrahim.”

“We recall that in 2019, at Okene, the Local Government PDP Chairman, Mr Musa Adelabu, was equally abducted by armed men in military camouflage and has not been seen again. We have cried out and petitioned various security agencies to no avail. Since nobody could immediately recognise any of the gunmen in that abduction, they had been comfortable deciding an unknown fate for him. Nobody knows if he’s still alive or not. But we have maintained that he is a victim of Mr Yahaya Bello’s regime of violence.

“But in this case, the Naval Officer identified as Charles has been recognised as the leader of the gang of armed men that stormed the house of Ibrahim to abduct him at about 11om on Monday, October 24, 2022.

“We hereby condemn the eager connivance of security agencies in Kogi State in perpetuating and sustaining the APC regime of violence, intimidation and terror in the state.”

The PDP alleged that so far all the thugs who unleashed the bloodletting across the state were walking around either as free men or were pardoned by the government of Yahaya Bello from incarceration.

“We have no doubt that the abduction of Mallam Ibrahim in Abuja is a prelude to the violence to be unleashed on supporters of the PDP and other parties opposed to the APC in Kogi as threatened by Bello.

“Mallam Ibrahim publicly renounced the APC only on Sunday, October 9, 2022, in Okene to the displeasure of Bello’s government with the Governor’s Chief Of Staff, Abdulkareem Asuku, openly attacking the defector as an ungrateful person.

The Chief of Staff and the now-abducted defector have been engaged in a public war of words ever since.

The party added, “Last week, Mallam Ibrahim released an audio tape alleging that the Chief of Staff had previously given him a gun to use for thuggery while declaring that he now preferred the PDP because he was offered an alternative life free from violence and thuggery.

“He claimed Asuku thereafter had called to threaten his life for having the effrontery to decamp to the PDP.

“Reacting, Mr Asuku in a now-viral video admitted calling Ibrahim on phone but denied threatening his life. He, however, insisted that the defector was an ungrateful person who despite being released from a long prison term by Governor Bello’s fiat and given lots of assistance had turned full circle to bite the fingers that fed him by decamping to the PDP.

“This abduction coming after this altercation is an act of malice by a government that has gained notoriety for unleashing disproportionate overwhelming violence on acts of dissent.

“We call on the Inspector-General of Police, The Director-General of the Department of State Services, the Chief of Defence Staff and all the service chiefs to stand up to this occasion.”

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