Kogi poll: PDP condemns alleged attack on members at Tribunal

The Peoples Democratic Party has condemned the alleged violent attack on its leaders, members, lawyers and witnesses at the premises of the Kogi State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal in Abuja.
The party made the condemnation in a statement issued by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, on Friday in Abuja.
Ologbondiyan described the attack  as part of the desperate plots to eliminate some of its leaders, trigger confusion, disrupt and manipulate the judicial process and instil fear in the tribunal judges in a bid to subvert the course of justice.
He said there was no way the alleged manipulations at the November 16, 2019 Kogi State governorship election could stand before the law.
Ologbondiyan said it was indeed a terrific sight when scores of hoodlums attacked PDP leaders, for which some members and witnesses were now receiving treatment in various hospitals.
He said: “The party however, insists that no amount of violence, intimidation or blackmail can cow it into abandoning its avowed determination to retrieve the mandate freely given to its candidate by the people of Kogi state in the November 2019 governorship election.
“The PDP also called on the judges of the tribunal not to be deterred by the antics of the APC but stand firm on the side of the law and the mandate of the people of Kogi state.”
Ologbondiyan cautioned the perpetrators  to desist from such attack as the people of Kogi State might not have any other option than to use every means of self defence allowed and available in a democracy, in the face of any such attack in the future.
He urged the Inspector General of Police to interrogate the All Progressives Congress Kogi State Chairman, Abdullahi Bello, for eventual prosecution over the violent attack at the tribunal.
He said: “The police should also bar him from the sittings of the tribunal due to his unruly conduct.”