Mr. Jimi Agbaje, People’s Democratic Party (PDP) Governorship Candidate for Lagos State, has protested the massive destruction of his publicity boards on the Third Mainland Bridge and other parts of Lagos, while placing the blame squarely on the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and its candidate.
He said the destruction represented the height of political intolerance and impunity from a ruling party clearly staring defeat in the face in the 2019 gubernatorial elections.
Agbaje challenged the police to immediately apprehend the hooligans.
Recalling that his publicity materials had suffered similar violence in 2015, Agbaje, in a statement by his campaign’s Director of Media and Publicity, Felix Oboagwina, said that, Lagosians could only break free from such self-serving and corrupt tendencies by voting out APC in the 2019 polls.
“This unprovoked display of madness appeals to the base and the pedestal. It is barbaric, offensive, confrontational and highly provocative. I hold the APC, its candidate Mr. Babajide Sanwoolu and their paymasters responsible for the vandalisation of our publicity A-boards,” Agbaje said. “And I warn them to rein in their attack dogs!”
He however urged his teeming supporters to keep calm and maintain the peace.
“Less than 24 hours after we mounted those boards, APC’s forces of evil brought them down overnight in this orgy of irrational violence,” Agbaje lamented. “Reports have reached me that boys handling our posters have been harassed and beaten by APC thugs.”
According to a statement by Felix Oboagwina, it was no coincidence that the mayhem occurred on a night in which Agbaje outshone Sanwoolu at a Christian programme that both candidates attended.
“Babajide Sanwoolu and Jimi Agbaje went as guests to the UNUSUAL PRAISE CONCERT in Lekki. When the two men were introduced, the crowd appreciated and applauded them. But the difference was clear. In fact, if an election were to have taken place there and then, Sanwoolu would lose deposit and Agbaje would win hands down. The ovation that greeted the introduction of JK brought down the roof figuratively.
“Sanwoolu left ahead of Agbaje. Soon after Sanwoolu left, reports came that our boards had been mangled, hacked and vandalised. APC’s hired goons went on their destruction spree around 3-4am. Why was it that just on the same line of sight, the boards mounted for Sanwoolu stood untouched?
“Their boards have been there for the past three months, but our supporters did them no harm.
“This is history repeating itself as this was the same style that APC employed in 2015. All it shows is that APC has nothing new to offer. These are people who pay lip service to democracy but they have no modicum of it in their bloodstream. This clearly demonstrates that they cannot take competition.
“But we shall not descend into this black-hole of evil with them. We refuse to be caught in the web of an-eye-for-an-eye and their-boards-for-our-boards.
“How come this wanton destruction is being sponsored by a ruling party whose priority should be the preservation of law and order? And here they are overheating the polity!
“We are hereby asking the police, the security agencies and the electoral umpire to call APC to order.
“APC must know that nobody can lay claim to a monopoly on violence. Although we shall never support reprisals, the people can only take so much. Lagosians themselves may just decide that they have had enough of this era of impunity and rise against APC and their paid thugs.”
