The leadership of the Labour Party has called on President Bola Tinubu to caution the Governor of Abia State, Alex Otti, over alleged unguarded utterances against the National Chairman of the party, Julius Abure.
The party accused Otti of issuing unwarranted threats to the Labour Party chairman and some other members of the party.
In a statement issued on Monday by the National Secretary of the party, Umar Ibrahim, LP said Otti’s statement disparaging Abure and even calling for his arrest would not be tolerated.
Ibrahim, in the statement, said that the party is not only condemning Otti’s utterances but also seeking the intervention of leaders across the country to rein him in.
He said, “We are not only condemning this despicable action of the governor who was recently suspended by the party, but are also seeking the intervention of well-meaning Nigerians, including President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, to persuade the governor from further threats to our party and the leadership.
“We ordinarily do not always respond to the rantings of most of our members who are undergoing disciplinary actions but on a deeper reflection and going by recent actions especially by this same governor, we deemed it necessary to point out that several threats coming from the governor and his agents in the last few months must not be swept under the carpet,” Ibrahim noted.
Recall that Otti had asked the Inspector General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, to, as a matter of urgency, arrest Abure for impersonation.
The call for the arrest of the National Chairman by Otti followed the decision of the Abure-led faction of the Labour Party to sack the Abia governor and some other party members, including Ireti Kingibe, the senator representing the Federal Capital Territory.
The governor, relying on the Supreme Court judgement over the leadership tussle rocking the party, said Abure cannot continue to assume the position of the National Chairman of the Labour Party despite being sacked by the court.
However, in today’s statement, the national secretary said, “His (Otti’s) recent threat to arrest Abure and the National Working Committee members for suspending him is one threat too many.
“We are by this statement calling on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to rein in the governor and to remind him that there is no place for tyranny in a democratic system. We advise Alex Otti to know that the ‘Our Lives Matter’, politics or not,” Ibrahim added. It
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