A Federal House of Representatives aspirant for Ibadan North West and Ibadan South West constituency and chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Mogaji Akin Fagbemi on Wednesday fled from the primary of the party at the NTC area of Iyaganku Sharp corner in Ibadan when thugs numbering over 200 stormed the venue and threatened to kill his supporters and delegates should anyone cast votes for him.
A message which read “Vote Akin Fagbemi, vote for Acid. Vote Akin Fagbemi, vote for death” was severally received by delegates believed to be sympathetic to him and this made him to alert the police and the DSS.
Sensing that the security agents appeared helpless, Fagbemi with scores of his supporters told journalists at an hideout in Ibadan that they had to run for their lives.
Fagbemi regretted that the PDP that he and a few others started its rebuilding process since July, 2015 through various empowerment programmes and supports to party members in the state have been hijacked for selfish ends by those who came to join later.
He recalled how the party chairman in Ibadan South West and a State Officer of PDP in connivance with some elders in the area threatened to deal with him should he go ahead with his ambition, a threat he rebuffed, believing that “in a democracy, people’s votes should count not knowing that desperadoes would not allow free, fair and credible election to bring out the best candidate.”
Akin Fagbemi added: “200 thugs armed to the teeth were brought to the venue of the primary and they were all over the place threatening to kill or maim whoever identify with me. They came with liquid contents suspected to be acids. We are law abiding people and we left the venue for them. We wrote a letter to the committee that we cannot go to this primary unless security was provided abinitio and our fears were later confirmed with the threats to my life and those of my supporters.
“He who fights and run away, lives to fight another day and I also believe that tough times never last but tough people do. God’s promise for us shall come into fruition in the fullness of time,” Fagbemi averred.
Chief Akin Fagbemi who hailed from Ibadan North West has therefore called on his supporters and well wishers to remain calm and await the next line of action as he could no longer cohabit with ‘desperadoes’ in a party he used his hard-earn wealth and energies to labour hard to rebuild in Ibadan North West and Ibadan South West constituency.
