We Are Too Much To Contend With Noncontenders, Kogi Govt Retorts SDP

LAGOS – The Kogi State Government has, in a strongly worded statement, dismissed in totality a press release published in certain blogs insinuating that the Yaya Bello-led administration and the very diligently busy security agencies in the state are plotting to suppress the attention-begging gubernatorial candidate of a sinking party ahead of the November 11 governorship election in the state.

The punchy but self-explanatory statement e-signed by Kingsley Fanwo, the Kogi State Commissioner for Information and Communications and made available to Daily Independent reads:

“We wouldn’t have bothered to respond to the watery, evasive and sympathy-seeking sinking candidate of the Social Democratic Party, who is dipping himself in the messy mud and having an ignominious macabre dance on the sensibilities of Kogites and Nigerians as a whole.

“It is important to tell Nigerians and the world that Muritala Yakubu Ajaka, the said Governorship candidate of the Social Democratic Party, is on a blisteringly shameful agenda of whipping sentiments, spreading falsehood with reckless abandon so as to put on himself, a garment of importance and create unnecessary air around himself as a contender that he is not.

“Kogites and Nigerians know Muritala Yakubu Ajaka and they know that his intention is to create ethnic division and blow his own ego. We know the contenders and the pretenders and he is not a political threat as far as Kogi State is concerned.

“The ignorance of Muritala Yakubu Ajaka and his team is such a flourishing folly, thinking that the Governor is an interested party and would therefore allow his state to become a state of anomie and lawlessness.

“The Governor of Kogi State, His Excellency Alh. Yahaya Bello, CON, is the Governor of all the people of Kogi State and he owes them a duty of care and security. He swore to protect them and protect them he shall.

“The State Government has no clandestine plan to frame up anyone, not to talk about political Lilliputians with questionable character.

“As a Government, we will not condone reckless statements as we urge the security agencies to arrest the current trend by acting decisively against inflammatory statements. A lack of action has emboldened some political opportunists to think they can spread lies, incite the people, play politics of ethnic profiling and still get away with them.

“Muritala Yakubu Ajaka knows what he has done and should carry his cross boldly instead of hiding behind one finger. We have no hand in the problems that his unbridled inordinate ambition has brought upon him.

“The tactless and dubious attempt to blackmail media practitioners shows the myopia of Muritala Yakubu Ajaka and his co-travelers to political oblivion. History has shown that no one can ever defeat the media, especially when practitioners are on the path of truth. The media won’t be cowed by an unknown, misled, dubious and unguarded political minor.”

To this end, the Kogi State government has assured all political parties and candidates of their safety as they go about their electioneering.

“The State Government will not succumb to the blackmail of the unpopular candidate of the SDP.”; the statement concluded.