The opposition New Nigeria People’s Party, NNPP, has threatened to embark on mass protest across the 44 Local Government Areas of Kano State against arrest and detention of over 100 of its key members.
The party said unless the CP is removed and penalised for his misconduct, the protest will continue.
Addressing a press conference on behalf of the NNPP in Kano on Sunday, the Kano North senatorial candidate of the party, Baffa Bichi, alleged that the state commissioner of police, Mamman Dauda, is conniving with the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC to subvert the March 15 governorship election in the state.
Mr Bichi alleged that the police commissioner, in connivance with the state government, are planing to arrest more of their members ahead of the election.
According to him, the Governor Abdullahi Ganduje-led administration has directed local government chairmen to generate list of all important NNPP stakeholders in their localities, alleging that the party is also aware that “the list has been given to the CP and he has already directed DPOs to swing into action.”
“Over one hundred of our members have so far been illegally arrested and are being unlawfully detained at the police headquarters. We are also aware that all our Senatorial candidates, all our House of Representatives candidates and majority of our State Assembly candidates as well as our party chairman and senior party activists are all included in the evil list of the CP and Governor Ganduje,” he said.
Mr Bichi also alleged that the police commissioner is working with the state’s Attorney General to frame charges of attempted murder on all the NNPP members in their custody.
“This is evil. This injustice is as incomprehensible as it is reprehensible.
“The CP has also directed all DPOs not to accept any complaints letter from our party. All the previous complaints that we have written to the CP and to all DPOs were not acted upon. While every spurious complain from the APC is acted upon by the CP with promptness,” NNPP alleged.
The opposition party, therefore, gave a 24-hour ultimatum to release the detained members and called on authorities concerned to intervene in a bid to stop harassment of its members and leaders, failing which it will stage a peaceful protest across the 44 local councils of the state.
The party also called on the Inspector-General of Police to immediately redeploy Mr Daura from Kano ahead of the general elections.
“We wish to unequivocally state that the NNPP is giving all the authorities concerned a notice of 24 hours to release all our members, stop harassing our members and leaders, and direct the Kano Police command to stop campaigning for the APC.
“At the expiration of the 24 hours notice, we will lead all our members to a peaceful protest across all the 44 LGAs in the state. By this, we notified the police and DSS to provide security cover for the protest.
“We wish to clearly state that our party and all its candidates are considering a withdrawal from the already signed Peace Accord facilitated by the National Peace Committee if the CP, Governor Ganduje and their cahoots are not properly called to order to allow the peaceful conduct of 2023 elections in Kano State,” he added.
When contacted for comment, the spokesman of the Kano State Police Command, SP Abdullahi Kiyawa, did not respond to calls from our correspondent as at the time of filing this report.
