The Peoples Democratic Party(PDP), Ondo State Chapter, has raised the alarm over the ceaseless killings of hapless residents of the State, whose main offence is that they lawfully engage in their daily activities needed to bring food to their tables.
The party in a statement by its Director of Media and Publicity, Leye Igbabo, on Tuesday in Akure, lamented the incessant killings of residents, mostly farmers.
The statement read in parts: “The Party cannot in all honesty, find reasons why such assailants could operate without any form of resistance for months running, in a State where there is said to be a valid government in place.
“Governor Aiyedatiwa has indeed failed in his constitutional duty as enshrined in Section 14(2)b of the 1999 constitution as amended, in that he can no longer secure and protect lives and property of citizens of Ondo State.
“It is heart-wrenching to note that in less than one month, about fifty persons have been gruesomely massacred in various settlements within the State.
“Sadly, no arrest or prosecution has been made since then and neither was any arrest even made of the marauding armed herdsmen who were on killing spree in the past.
“The PDP therefore wonders if a government still exists in Ondo State in the face of these unprovoked and unrestrained killings.
“Our Party heard from a reliable source that the clear inaction of the State Governor might be due to the unholy alliance and unwholesome support that the Governor sought and got from certain powerful individuals atop the All Progressive Congress (APC), when he was running for the gubernatorial candidature of the party last year.
“We have reasons to believe that Governor Aiyedatiwa’s hands are tied and incapacitated because most of these mindless killings are allegedly being perpetrated by criminals from his benefactor’s geopolitical zone and ethnic group.
“The Peoples Democratic Party Ondo State Chapter frowns at this horrible situation and sincerely admonishes the State Governor to desist from playing politics with the lives and fortunes of harmless residents who he swore to protect, in the first instance.
“These killings are one too many and indicative of helplessness, hopelessness and huge compromise of those in the corridor of power in Ondo State.
“The Party, is by this statement, equally drawing the kind attention of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, to these crude and unwarranted killings and to note the incapacitation of the State Government in tackling the growing menace.
“The kind attention of Mr President, under the prevailing circumstances, is to prepare him to consider the declaration of a state of emergency on insecurity in Ondo State, if the State government continues to demonstrate a lack of capacity to halt the senseless killings before the State, nay the whole South-West is turned to slaughter-house for incessant spilling of the blood of innocent souls.”
