‘Place Keyamo on terror list’ | ‘Obi wants to cause religious crisis’ — LP, APC campaign spokesman trade words

The Labour Party has called on security agencies to place Festus Keyamo, spokesperson of the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential campaign council, on security watch list.

The party was responding to Keyamo’s allegation that Peter Obi, the standard bearer of Labour Party, was planning to fake an assassination attempt by hiring hoodlums donning APC caps and T-shirts to attack his party offices.

Keyamo had also accused the former governor of Anambra of stoking ethnic tensions and divisions in a viral video showing him saying that people have been asked not to vote for him in the south-west to malign Bola Tinubu, presidential candidate of the APC.

But reacting through a statement on Tuesday, Abayomi Arabambi, spokesperson of the Labour Party, said the security chiefs should place Keyamo on a watch list for “unlawful and treasonable activities” in the country.

“President Muhammadu Buhari must now as a matter of urgency directs the service chiefs to place Festus Keyamo and other APC presidential Campaign members and supporters on a security watch list as they are now a threat to democracy ahead of the 2023 general elections” the statement reads.

“I called on the Inspector General of Police to urgently commence a comprehensive investigation into Mr Festus Keyamo unlawful and treasonable activities.

“His conducts are likely to cause a breach of peace and anarchy in our country if this ugly trend is not nipped in the bud and Keyamo be made to face possible prosecution in a court of Law.”

He added that the Labour Party see Keyamo’s outburst as a confession of the ploy of the ruling party to employ crude tactics to win the 2023 polls.

“LP sees the forced self-confession of the APC about the conspiracy being floated by the APC to assassinate the most popular and supported people’s preferred and loved 2023 Presidential Candidate, as yet another proof of God’s involvement with the Peter Obi candidacy,” he said.

“It is also the responsibility of security agencies to ensure that all the candidates are truly secured. The LP is loudly and clearly expressing its condemnation of the criminally-inclined politics the APC is trying to re-introduce into the Nigerian political system.

“Labour party considered this devilish act by the APC presidential spokesman as not only deceitful but a subtle way to gain unmerited sympathy in their bogus attempt at employing crude primitive tactics clandestinely in order to win the 2023 presidential election through fraudulent means.”

But Keyamo, APC presidential campaign spokesperson, said he is convinced Obi wants to cause religious crisis in the country by circulating hate message against Tinubu and failing to apologise for his action.

“I also call on the security agencies in Nigeria to place Mr. Peter Obi and his some of his demented supporters on the terror watch lists for circulating an incendiary video with a fake message by one of his supporters called Powell Glad Legbe (on his Facebook page) calling on Yorubas not to vote for Peter Obi,” he said.

“Mr. Peter Obi then wrongly and wickedly attributed that quote to an amorphous ‘Tinubu group’. Up till now he has not withdrawn his accusation nor has he apologised to our candidate Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

“It is obvious Mr. Peter Obi wants to cause religious crises in the country and for this, I call on the security agencies to place Mr. Peter Obi on security watch or invite him for a thorough investigation. If necessary, I prepared to be invited too as a witness to prove my case against him.”