Afenifere raises concern over hostile campaign

As the general elections draw nearer, the Pan Yoruba socio-political organisation, Afenifere, yesterday raised concern over the increasing verbal and physical attacks in the ongoing electioneering campaigns across the country.

Afenifere through its National Publicity Secretary, Comrade Jare Ajayi, stated that political parties and their candidates should focus on issues regarding how they will tackle the myriad of challenges that the country is facing rather than coming up with utterances and actions that border on “de-marketing of opponents and possibly causing bodily harms on other people”.

Daily Trust reports that the campaign has recently become acrimonious with candidates hurling verbal attacks on one another while physical attacks have also been reported in a few places.

It would be recalled that Mr. Festus Keyamo, SAN, last week came up with various allegations against the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.

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In the same vein, the spokesman for the PDP, Honourable Debo Ologunagba, had accused the presidential candidate of the ruling party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Ahmed Bola Tinubu of directing “his party members to unleash violence on Nigerians”.

Afenifere said the verbal attacks emanating from some candidates and their spokespersons were encouraging their unscrupulous supporters to violently attack opponents in a manner that could result in bloodshed.