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Governor …Sanwo Olu of Lagos State should be held responsible for all the attacks unleashed on the opposition and Ndigbo in Lagos State during this electioneering period.
Human Rights, Liberty Access, and Peace Defenders’Foundation (HURIDE) which stated this in a statement in Onitsha, Anambra State yesterday condemned the act of brigandage and incivility which has characterised Sanwo-Olu’s second term campaigns.
The opposition parties in Lagos State, Ndigbo, their shops and facilities have been targeted for attacks in the build-up to the Governorship and House of Assembly campaigns.
A spare parts market mainly occupied by Igbos was recently razed down, while some political parties’ campaign trains were attacked by hoodlums believed to be All Progressives Congress (APC) loyalists, working for Sanwo-Olu.
Just a few days ago, a pupil in one of the schools in Lagos State was sent home by the school authority for using Peter Obi, Labour Party’s presidential candidate’s campaign poster to rap his book.
But HURIDE in the statement endorsed by its Executive Director, Dede Uzor A Uzor, released in Ikeja, Lagos condemned this Sanwo-Olu’s hysterical desperation in his second term campaigns, which has led to all these primitive attacks on the citizens of this country in Lagos State.
The group said democracy is not the rule of brute force but by freedom, for people to choose their leaders, saying that it is unfortunate that after four years in the saddle, Sanwo-Olu could not beat his chest and ask Lagosians irrespective of ethnic and religious background and party affiliation to vote him based on his track record and he yet to open and condemn Such heinous crime including the one directed Labour Party Governorship candidate GRV among others
This, said the rights group, has compelled him to resort to intimidation and violence, thinking that would be his saving grace.
HURIDE expressed shock that Lagos which prizes itself as a State of excellence is engaging in crude attack and unleashing injury and pain on people they perceived not to be their supporters.
The rights group said they have been chronicling all the atrocities being inflicted on the opposition, Ndigbo and others in Lagos State on account of this election and would not hesitate to push for severe consequences for the perpetrators.
They also threatened to drag Sanwo-Olu and his cohorts to Court to account for their heinous attacks on innocent people because of his second-term ambition.
The group called on the international community: the United Nations, African Union, the United States, Canada and the European Union as well as international humanitarian organisations like Amnesty International and Human Right Watch to take note of the destructive activities of the Lagos State Governor in the build-up to this election.
