Many people sustained injuries on Monday as supporters of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the All Progressives Congress (APC) clashed in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
One of those injured were the APC governorship candidate in the March 18th governorship election, Tonye Cole, who sustained an injury in his neck.
Earlier, some members of the PDP had protested in front of the office of the Independent National Electoral Commission along Aba Road in Port Harcourt.
The protesters had demanded a joint inspection of election materials by all political parties.
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The APC, led by its governorship candidate, had last Friday said they would storm the INEC office on Monday to demand release of certified true copies of documents used for the March 18 governorship election to enable the party file processes at the election petition tribunal.
Our reporter, who was at the scene, reports that while the PDP protest festered, Cole in company with the state APC Chairman, Emeka Beke, and other party leaders showed up at the GRA axis of Aba Road and was proceeding to the INEC office when the protesters sighted him.
The protesting youths raced towards his direction, pelting him with stones and sachets of water.
Security operatives attached to Cole immediately shielded him and whisked him into the vehicle, but the protesters continued hauling objects at his direction.
Within seconds, soldiers of the 6 Division of the Nigerian Army, operatives of the Nigeria Police and Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps arrived and shot into the air to disperse the protesters.
An eyewitness told our correspondent that one of the security men attached to Cole fired the shot which hit one of the protesters who was advancing towards him.
The man bled profusely on the floor due to the gunshot to his leg. His friends later took him to a hospital.
Sensing that the PDP supporters were more, Cole’s security details whisked him away from the scene, while the APC supporters scampered to safety.
As of the time of filing this report, normalcy had yet to fully return to the GRA Junction near the INEC office in Port Harcourt.
