TRIBUNE
The Edo State Government on Wednesday fingered the immediate past National Chairman of the All Progressive Congress (APC), Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, as being behind the riots that broke out early on Wednesday morning in Benin City, the state capital, during which three people were killed and a number of banks and other infrastructures destroyed, as the protesters expressed their anger over the scarcity of the new naira notes occasioned by the redesigning of the 1,000, 500 and 200 denominations of the nation’s currency.
The state government, which described the riots as “systematic and targeted at Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) controlled states”, called on security agencies to “invite Oshiomhole, interrogate him and arrest him to account for his movements within Beni city in the last couple of days”.
Addressing a press conference after the Military stepped in to arrest the situation, Edo State Commissioner for Communication and Orientation, Chris Osa Nehikhare, said that the state government, after appraising the situation, “discovered that there is more than meets the eyes.
“Today, we had the unfortunate incident of the protest in Edo State, particularly in Benin City as a result of the new naira redesigning policy. We have gone around the town and we have discovered that there is more than meets the eye. We are by this press conference calling on all security agencies to call on Comrade Adams Oshiomhole for questioning, arrest him and make him account for his movements in the last couple of days in Benin City.
“We have reasons to believe that Oshiomhole instigated the riots. There is a video, which has gone viral, where Oshiomhole is seen instigating his lions and tigers to riot, destroy and attack government property. Today’s riot is thought to be a result of the naira redesigning. It is the same party responsible for the policy, that is the one instigating people to protest and in doing that PDP billboards are destroyed. One of the billboards destroyed is a 50-foot gantry.
“Oshiomhole has unleashed his lions and tigers because his party is about to face an imminent defeat at the coming general elections”, Nehikhare, who was flanked at the press conference by Crusoe Osagie, the Special Adviser to Governor Godwin Obaseki on…
