Ijaw group, Sylva trade words over Nembe killings

The Ijaw Young Professionals in Bayelsa State at the weekend accused the opposition party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) of mas terminding the attack on military men in Nembe on Thursday, killing four soldiers and a mobile policeman. It said that it was part of a plot by the Timipre Sylva-led APC to create a sense of insecurity in the state ahead of the December 5 governorship elections. In a statement, the leader of the body, Barrister Seighfa Tonye-Brown, alleged that the yet to be identified gunmen had attacked the military personnel about midnight on Thursday, killed the four men in uniform and took their rifles. He also claimed that the gunmen removed four machine guns from the military boats and another machine gun that was placed on duty, alleging that the weapons were being gathered in readiness for use during the elections. He alleged that this latest incident was among the plans being hatched by the opposition party to unleash, between now and the election, tension and insecurity in the state in order to force the hand of President Muhammadu Buhari to declare a state of emergency and possibly take over the state. The strategy, he said, would also lead to change in the security high command in Bayelsa State as a ploy to situate the change as necessary because of high level of violence and insecurity in the state, adding that the impending change could take place next week. “By next week, we are well informed that the Police Commissioner and Director of SSS will be replaced with new officers who will do the bidding of the APC in the forthcoming governorship elections,” he stated, noting that the opposition party had perfected strategies to carry out the plot to remove the governor by resorting to violence to achieve its objective. “Already, this attack on the military men is a clear pointer to the execution of the evil plot and we are reliably informed that more sinister actions are on the way”, he alleged. “The resort to violence as the only means of winning elections in this state is no longer fashionable. The people of the only Ijaw state say no to violence. We reject APC and its brand of violent politics. Their hope that increased violence and insecurity will force Buhari to declare a state of emergency in Bayelsa State has failed,” he said. But in a swift reaction, former Bayelsa State governor and chieftain of the All Progressives Congress, APC, Tmipre Sylva, debunked the allegations linking him to the dastardly attack on the Joint Task Force, Operation Pulo Shield base in Nembe. In a statement by his media aide, Mr. Doifie Buokoribo, and made available to Sunday Sun, Sylva described the allegation by Ijaw Young Professionals as “wild, unsubstantiated and irresponsible.” Sylva maintained that neither himself nor the APC was contemplating employing violence to win the forthcoming governorship elections in the state. The statement by Buokoribo reads in part: “Sylva wishes to state categorically that he knows nothing whatsoever about the Nembe killings. Similarly, neither Sylva nor the APC that he leads in the state is privy to any plan to employ violence as a strategy to win the December 5, 2015 gubernatorial election in the state. “Sylva notes further that the escalation of violence in the state should be put squarely at the doorstep of the incumbent government of Mr. Henry Seriake Dickson. That government has failed woefully in securing lives and property, but instead has overtly and covertly procured and traded in violence to intimidate political opponents and any voice of reason.” ­
The Sun