Ekiti PDP Crisis: Thugs attack Sheriff’s faction secretariat, destroy valuable things
…Their allegation frivolous, says Fayose’s faction
The secretariat of Ekiti State People’s Democratic Party (PDP) faction loyal to the National Chairman Senator Ali Modu
Sheriff was on Wednesday attacked by people suspected to be political thugs.
The building located at Nova Road junction in Adebayo area of Ado Ekiti, the state capital was vandalized in the early hours of the day with some facilities destroyed in the process.
The invaders scaled the fence to gain entrance into the compound and smashed all the glass windows and uprooted all the flag poles and tore the PDP flags hoisted on them.
The vandalized secretariat is the operational base of the Williams Ajayi-led faction loyal to Sheriff. The other faction led by Gboyega Oguntuase which is loyal to Senator Ahmed Makarfi is also backed by Governor Ayo Fayose.
An Ado Ekiti Federal High Court on January 24 declared the Ajayi-led group as the authentic state executive of the party ordering the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to do business with it.
But the Court of Appeal in Ado Ekiti last week ordered a stay of execution and held that the two factions should maintain the status quo pending the determination of the substantive suit before it.
Speaking with reporters on the attack, the Deputy Chairman of the Ajayi faction, Olasunkanmi Ogunbiyi, alleged that the attack was carried out by the faction backed by Fayose calling on security agencies to up their game and prevent breakdown of law and order.
Ogunbiyi said: “We left the office on Tuesday at about 6pm and only to return today around 7am and saw the flags erected brought down. The assailants scaled the fence and destroyed all the flags and the louvre blades of our office.
“They even made spirited efforts to gain entry into the office, but they could not. As we speak now, our lives are being threatened and we want the public to be aware of this.
“However, we had inkling that our office will be attacked with the threat issued by one of the Oguntuase’s executive to us when we met recently at the Court of Appeal that our office will be attacked.
“Last week also, Governor Fayose went to a nearby spot within the vicinity of the office and distributed rice to the people.
We are sure that the Oguntuase’s people are behind this and we need a prompt action from the security agencies”.
But the spokesman of the Oguntuase faction, Jackson Adebayo, denied the accusation claiming that “erosion and rainstorm” might have affected the secretariat describing the allegation as “frivolous.”
Adebayo said: “I saw what they are calling the press for and I concluded that they are still in shock how they got to that sorry pass.
“There were storm and erosion, which affected their building and they are claiming that reasonable people would leave their jobs to be digging their fences and destroying blocks.
“They should be pitied rather than responded to because there’s no such thing as what they are alleging.”
