femi folaranmi, yenagoa
Bayelsa State governor, Henry Seriake Dickson, and Ijaw National Leader, Chief Edwin Clark, have raised the alarm over the increasing abuse of security agencies by the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Federal Government.
A statement by the state government quoted Governor Dickson and the elder statesman as raising the concern when Pa Clark paid him a condolence visit on the death of his mother, Madam Goldcoast Dickson, in Abuja, on Friday. The governor said Nigerians were deeply worried about the conduct of security agencies across in the country.
According to him, the security agencies were disturbingly metamorphosing into an extension of the ruling party, the APC, ahead of the 2019 general election.
Governor Dickson condemned the recent assassination attempt on the Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu, and the police invasion of the Akwa Ibom State House of Assembly.
He described the action of the police authorities, who sealed off the House of Assembly, as an assault on the democratic order, which he, said should not be encouraged.
Dickson stated further that the recent posting of eight police commissioners to Bayelsa State within a shockingly short period of three months only showed a sinister plot to destabilise the peace, security and stability of the state ahead of the 2019 general elections.
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He called on the relevant authorities and the security agencies to conduct themselves in a way that would promote the nation’s democracy rather than putting it in jeopardy.
“Let us not in the quest for election, destroy these critical agencies of state and the career and reputation of these officials. When you politicise these agencies, you threaten the careers of these people who are professionals in their own right,” Governor Dickson said.
Speaking also, Pa Clark condemned the erratic transfer of eight police commissioners to Bayelsa State in three months. He said that he was not surprised at the conduct of the police as they recently invaded his house in Abuja even at the age of 91 in a purported search for arms.
He cautioned a former governor of Bayelsa, who is a chieftain of the APC, who he accused of being behind the instigation of the politics in police postings to the state to stop making himself a laughing stock.