The Labour Party (LP) caucus in the House of Representatives, has queried the timing and intentions of the recent arrest of the National Chairman of the LP, Barrister Julius Abure in Edo state, describing it as cruel, dehumanising and an abuse of democratic ethos.
The Labour Reps expressed their dismay over the controversial arrest in a statement by the caucus Leader, Rep. Victor Ogene, in Abuja.
Ogene said the timing of the arrest on the eve of LP’s primary election for the forthcoming governorship election in Edo state, which the Barrister Abure-led National Working Committee (NWC) is overseeing, exposes the ugly development as a crudely scripted political charade that offends the sensibility of every true democrat and puts to question the integrity of the police in issues that involve the political class.
The LP caucus called on the Inspector General of the police to investigate the underlying issues that have put the police in a bad light, by “Once again soiling the institution in the mud of desperate tussle for political powers, by those who see politics as a do or die affair.”
Speaking further, Ogene said: “There is no excuse for the manner the police conducted the ill-timed and misleading arrest of LP national chairman. If there was any need for the police to take Barrister Abure in, a simple invitation would have sufficed.
“The inexplicable dehumanisation and brutalisation of Chief Abure was uncalled for. Democracy ought to refine our security agents and bring out the best in them, rather than enhance their biases and prejudices in society.
“It is absolutely unlikely that the National Chairman of either the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) or the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), would suffer similar ignoble treatment in the hands of the Nigerian police.
“Indeed, what was the rationale for arresting a man of Abure’s standing in society in such a Gestapo manner, drag him on the streets like a common felon, only to release him in the dead of the night?
“While we cannot prevent the nation’s security agencies from carrying out their constitutional assigned roles, we insist, as a Caucus, that civility, decorum and due process must be their watchword, always.
“Consequently, it is our demand that the perpetrators of this show of shame must be brought to book if only to serve as a potent reminder to the Government of the day, that the days of the jackboots are long over,” the statement added.
According to the spokesperson of the police for Zone 5, Edo state, Mr Tijani Momoh, the LP Chairman, Abure was arrested over a petition to the Inspector General of Police, in a case of alleged “attempted murder and conspiracy to commit dangerous harm.”
Emmanuel Ukoh
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