Angry youths in Bauchi on Thursday twice
pelted President Goodluck Jonathan’s campaign
team with stones and water sachets.
The broom-wielding youths first blocked the
motorcade of the President on Nasarawa Street
as it made its way to the palace of the Emir of
Bauchi, where Jonathan and his team were
going to pay homage.
It took the combined efforts of soldiers and riot
policemen to disperse the youths, who were
chanting anti-Peoples Democratic Party slogans
and extolling the All Progressives Congress
presidential candidate, Maj.Gen. Muhammadu
Buhari (retd.)
Along the popular Ran Road, some of the
youths, who were singing “Sai Buhari”
disrupted business activities.
In the President’s motorcade were Vice
President Namadi Sambo; Governor Isa
Yuguda; the PDP National Chairman, Adamu
Mu’azu; and the Minister of the Federal Capital
Territory, Senator Bala Mohammed.
Also on the convoy were Governors Ibrahim
Dankwambo (Gombe) and Godswill Akpabio
(Akwa-Ibom) as well as the Director-General of
the PDP Presidential Campaign Organisation,
Ahmadu Ali.
Jonathan and his team however made their
way to the Ibrahim Babangida Square venue of
the campaign rally where they were again
embarrassed by another set of broom-wielding
youths.
Before the arrival of the campaign team at the
venue, the youths were chanting solidarity
songs for the President and the PDP. They
marched round the venue with drums and
placards with the President’s pictures.
They however suddenly turned wild when the
programme began and started pelting
dignitaries on the platform with objects.
They also destroyed Jonathan’s campaign
posters, some of the canopies erected at the
venue and plastic chairs.
Water sachets were thrown at the FCT minister
while he was making his speech and pleading
with the people of the state to vote for
Jonathan and the PDP on February 14.
The other dignitaries on the stand had to
bend their heads to avoid being hit by the
objects that were hurled at them by the crowd.
The obviously embarrassed minister called on
Jonathan and other dignitaries to ignore what
was happening since it was the “handiwork of
the opposition.”
“Fellow supporters of the PDP, let’s ignore what
is happening. This is politics. It is the handiwork
of those who are bent on destroying politics in
Nigeria,” he told Jonathan and the other
members of the campaign team.
When Mohammed shouted, “Nigeria, ” the
crowd shouted back “sai Buhari,” “Ba mayi,”
meaning, “We don’t support the PDP, we
want Buhari.”
A security operative, who claimed to have
witnessed the incidents, told one of our
correspondents in Abuja, that six of his
colleagues in the Department of State Security,
were injured.
He added that four of them were treated at an
undisclosed hospital and discharged
immediately while the remaining two were
admitted.
The two, according to him, had deep cuts on
their heads.
The PUNCH reports that it was very obvious
that the President, Sambo and the other
dignitaries were not happy with the way and
manner they were treated.
This was evident by the look on their faces as
they hurriedly left the venue immediately after
Jonathan’s speech.
Jonathan, in his speech, vowed that
retrogressive forces would not push the PDP
behind in its efforts to develop northern Nigeria.
He promised that if re-elected, he would
develop the country particularly the North, by
educating and empowering youths and
women.
The President said, “There are distractions here.
We are lucky we are in Bauchi, the home of Sir
Abubakar Tafawa Balewa, one of the greatest
leaders who led this country very well. He is
appreciated from the North to the South; the
East to the West.
“He never instigated anybody against anybody.
He spoke about the unity and development of
this country and that is what the PDP stands
for.
“We must educate and empower our young
men and women so that they will not be used
by politicians to cause violence.”
Also, Sambo thanked the people of the state
for their reception but advised them to desist
from engaging in politics of religion.
He said, “Nigeria is not like Saudi Arabia or
Afghanistan which are Islamic countries but in
Nigeria we are mixed and we must work
together.”
A similar incident occurred on Monday when
Governor Isa Yuguda and other dignitaries were
stoned at the PDP governorship rally at the
Darazo Mini-Stadium by angry youths believed
to be supporters of the APC.
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