BY OUR CORRESPONDENT
The Nigerian Senate President, Senator Bukola Saraki has raised an alarm over alleged plot by the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Ibrahim Idris to kill him and his family members.
Saraki who is serving as the Director General of the Peoples Democratic Party Presidential Campaign Organisation made this known during a press conference in Abuja.
He called on the international communities to hold IGP Idris responsible if anything bad happened to him or members of his family.
Saraki said the IGP has tried “several tricks to implicate” him in some criminal charges, the first being the arrest of some cultists who were being compelled to claim they worked for him.
“Later, he went on to the Offa robbery case and politicized the investigation in order to rope me. In the process of forcing suspects to implicate me, the principal suspect died in their custody. He has also not succeeded with that plot. Who knows what else he may have planned?” he asked.
The Senate President cited three incidents to illustrate his fear about his security, saying that on Thursday, alleged supporters and thugs of the APC attacked PDP supporters at Adewole/Adeta, Ilorin, who were holding their weekly ward meetings.
“They disrupted the meetings by shouting their party slogan and when our people responded by mentioning our own slogan, they fired gunshots into their midst in Adewole/Adeta.
“They also inflicted machete cuts on some of them. As a result of this attack, two people suffered bullet wounds.”
Saraki added that on Thursday, the same set of thugs went to his family quarters in Agbaji in Ilorin and vandalised houses, shops and inflicted machete wounds on three persons.
“All this destruction took place in the presence of policemen who came with them but watched without any care, as the APC thugs and supporters unleashed violence on our people.
“For me, personally, I believe the decision to attack people and properties in my family ancestral compound is a direct affront and attack on my person.
“And whatever signal these APC elements with support from the Police believe they are sending is definitely sinister, uncivilised and unfortunate.
“Our people have filed reports of the incidents in relevant Police stations in Ilorin, but we have doubts that anything tangible and constructive will come out of these reports.”
Saraki added that the same Police under the directive of Inspector General of Police, Mr. Ibrahim Idris, on Thursday commenced the transfer of Divisional Police Officers out of Kwara.
The Senate President said that while the Police were free to take decisions on the deployment of their personnel, he found the postings in Kwara State strange and more than a mere coincidence.
“It should also be noted that IGP has posted three different Commissioners of Police to Kwara State in the last six months.
“In fact, the previous and current Commissioner of Police in the State got strict instructions from the IGP not to relate or engage with the Senate President.
“The usual practice has been that the Commissioner of Police personally ensures the security of the Senate President whenever he visits his home state. That was the practice during the period of my predecessor and in my first year in office.”
The Senate President said, “We need to make it clear to the entire world that now that ward to ward campaigns is about to begin in the state and I am set to participate in that grassroots campaign as I have always done.
“Nobody is sure what instructions Mr. Idris has given to the police command in the state.
“Thus, the entire world should hold the IGP responsible if anything untoward happens to members of my family and myself.”