The opposition All Progressives Congress (APC) in Rivers State has accused the State government of sponsoring #EndBadGovernance protesters to vandalise its state secretariat in Port Harcourt.
This is as the protesters on Tuesday forced shop owners and motorists within Port Harcourt metropolis and its environs to mount leaves in front of their shops or on their vehicles or risk not being allowed to move around freely.
APC caretaker committee chairman in the state, Chief Tony Okocha, who spoke with journalists in Port Harcourt, said those who vandalised the party secretariat threatened to come back again for another attack.
Okocha: “Today, the issue in point is the vandalisation of the APC secretariat situate at 268B Port Harcourt-Aba Expressway by hoodlums, who were arranged, sponsored by a source, which in the course of this our engagement, I will reveal. I will name the source; we are not scared to name the source because the situation s become so political.
“And of course, you ask yourself; why is it that it is the APC office that was targeted for destruction? Millions of those attacks will not stop reggae. It will not stop us from speaking for the people of Rivers State. It will not stop us from being diametrically opposed to a governor and a government that is clueless. It can’t.
“Our secretariat was attacked yesterday and they left us with a note that they are coming back again. We don’t know whether coming back again will be today or in future. It was about 5:00pm yesterday that they vandalized our secretariat complex. We pre-empted them because we knew and we anticipated what they will do.
“We have information that they had been paid to destroy our party secretariat. And who is paying them? They are being paid and sponsored by the government of Rivers State. Their interest, as far as we are concerned, is to make Rivers State the epicenter of the protest.”
But, in a swift reaction, the Rivers State government denied sponsoring protesters to attack the APC secretariat, saying that it was not in the character of the present administration in the State to embark on such ugly venture.
The state’s Commissioner for Information and Communications, Warisenibo Joe Johnson, stated this on Tuesday in a chat with LEADERSHIP in Port Harcourt, the state capital.
Johnson said: “It is not in our character; it is not in our bloodline to destroy other people’s things. The governor spoke to the protesters and Femi Falana, SAN, was one of those who commended Governor Fubara for speaking to the protesters and it turned to celebration. We do not have such tendency.”