A chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Oyo state, Alhaji Adebisi Olopoenia, has raised an alarm over a planned intimidation and arrest by some policemen from the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Abuja who he said have landed in Ibadan, Oyo state capital with the sole aim of hand-picking perceived leaders of opposition Party, mainly, PDP, ahead of the rescheduled presidential and National Assembly election on Saturday.
Olopoenia stated this on Monday in an interview with journalists in Ibadan.
He noted that the hatchet job by the ruling party, All Progressive Congress (APC) is targeted at frustrating the leaders of the party and as well threatened party members in order not to come out and vote on Saturday.
The party leader added that information available to him affirmed that the team of police were camped at a popular hotel in Ibadan with the aim of swinging to action as early as tomorrow.
He said: “We learnt from authoritative sources that some police officers have arrived at a popular hotel in Ibadan with the sole aim of arresting leaders of our party, PDP, as from tomorrow.
“We have a police command in Ibadan which has been curtailing any crises before the election period. Why is it now that new officers are being commissioned to harass and arrest politicians, mainly of the opposition party and lock them up in Abuja.
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“Is that why they postponed the election? They want to use all means to frustrate our party members by all means. This technique cannot work because we are resolute in peace to vote for our candidates this weekend.
“We are using this medium to alert Oyo state Police Command headed by the new Commissioner of Police and the DSS that we are already aware of his move, calling on them that if any of our party members or leaders are missing as from now, the policemen from Abuja should be ready to answer their whereabouts.
“We condemn in totality the plot to intimidate, harass and arrest our members with the sole intention of paving way for a free day operation of the ruling party before, during and after Saturday election.
“As a party, we have been working in a violence-free manner to deliver our votes for the presidential candidate of PDP, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and his vice, Peter Obi this Saturday.
“No threat from the security agent which should protect all citizens irrespective of their party inclination but are now being used to intimidate our party members will succeed,” Olopoenia said.
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