*Nobody should take Keyamo seriously — Obi-Datti Media Office.
*Keyamo is a known rabble-rouser—LP PCC.
Festus Keyamo and Peter Obi; Image: Vanguard.
The spokesman for Bola Tinubu Campaign Council, Festus Keyamo (SAN), has written a petition to the Department of State Services (DSS) seeking the arrest and prosecution of Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi and his deputy, Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed for “incitement and treasonable felony."
According to a Newsdirect report, in the petition, dated March 23, 2023, Keyamo alleged that Obi and Datti are stoking civil unrest in the country through their messages on social media, instead of working for peace and unity of Nigeria after fiercely contested elections.
Keyamo wrote that the activities of the two Labour Party candidates subvert the lawsuits they filed in Court and portend
"something more sinister."
The minister of state for Labour and Employment also accused Peter Obi and Datti Baba-Ahmed of employing some youths to post daily inciting messages on social media to cause panic and fear in the country.
Keyamo's petition.
The petition partly said: “The President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu issued a statement to this effect a few days ago.
"However, it appears the Presidential and Vice-Presidential Candidates of the Labour Party, Mr. Peter Obi and Datti Baba-Ahmed are not prepared to toe this conciliatory path for the sake of peace and national cohesion, whilst exercising their rights to pursue duly laid down constitutional means of addressing their grievances." the petition read.
Peter Obi and Datti Baba-Ahmed.
It continued: “I also have it on good authority that Mr. Peter Obi and Datti Baba-Ahmed have camped some youths in a popular hotel in Abuja with the sole aim of instructing them to push out inciting messages every day on social media to cause panic and fear within the federation and to incite people to riot and social unrest.
“It is noteworthy that Peter Obi and Datti Baba-Ahmed have submitted Elections Petitions to the courts for adjudication, but their conducts and utterances amount to a subversion of the processes they have instituted in court and a subversion of our Constitution and the laid-down processes for addressing disputes and grievances.
“These conduct and utterances are a build-up to something more sinister and you must rein them in now!”
“In the circumstance, I submit this petition in my capacity as a patriotic Nigerian to invite/arrest, interrogate and after investigation, if necessary, charge both individuals to court for their conduct which amounts to incitement and treasonable felony,” Keyamo insisted.
Keyamo's call, a huge.
However, Diran Onifade, Head of the Obi-Datti Media Office, and the Labour Party Presidential Campaign Council, PCC have both dismissed Festus Keyamo's petition.
While Onifade called it a joke that no
Nigerian should take seriously, the Labour Party PCC described the petition as
a desperate effort by Keyamo to gain political relevance.
Reacting to a question by Vanguard about Keyamo’s petition on Thursday, Onifade said, "Such a call is a huge joke nobody should take seriously.
Datti never called for insurrection.
Labour Party logo.
Similarly, the spokesperson of the LP PCC, Dr. Yunusa Tanko, in a statement on Thursday said: “Datti is a free citizen of this country and entitled to his fundamental right of freedom of expression.
Datti never called for insurrection or any act envisaging treason.
“Keyamo talked about healing.
That means Nigeria is sick, that means he recognized that February 25 which announced his principal as the President-elect, and the March 18 state elections were marred by blatant rigging, high-level violence, voter suppression, and intimidation orchestrated by his party.
“Surprisingly Keyamo who claims to be a ‘patriotic citizen’ closed his eyes to the ethnic and tribal vitriolic by his party and their supporters against non-Yorubas in Lagos.
“The so-called ‘patriotic citizen’ didn’t report MC Oluomo who told Igbos not to vote in Lagos.
“After the shameful Chatham House appearance of Keyamo’s principal, his principal was recorded telling key supporters to fight, snatch, grab, and run with ballot boxes which were exactly what happened in the elections. Why didn’t Keyamo the ‘patriotic citizen’ report to the DSS?
“Keyamo is just making baseless accusations, he’s a known rabble-rouser and chatterbox who doesn’t want to lose political relevance before his paymaster who has now seen him for what he is, which is a political paperweight who has achieved nothing as a minister except posting fake news to rile up the polity on social media,” Dr. Yinusa Tanko stated.
Labour Party vice presidential candidate, in the February 25 election,
Datti Baba-Ahmed in a recent interview on Arise TV called on Nigeria's President Muhammadu Buhari not to transfer power to Bola Tinubu on May 29.
He also urged Nigeria's Chief Justice, Olukayode Ariwoola, not to administer the oath of office on Tinubu, saying that to transfer power to Bola Tinubu would be unconstitutional and similar to giving authority to a military regime.
Politics and Opinion.
Comments