CONFLICTING SIGNALS AS ACN ABORTS PRESIDENTIAL RALLY IN BAYELSA

By NBF News

Conflicting signals emerged on Monday over the proposed presidential rally of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) in Bayelsa State with the cancellation of the rally. While one version has it that the rally was cancelled on the grounds of security threat, another version said the rally was cancelled in Yenagoa due to logistic reasons.

According to some members of the party, the rally was aborted over what they called 'wrong signals'  from the state government and the issuance of threats from certain individuals that the lives of ACN members were not safe during the rally.

Investigations revealed that an emergency meeting of the party and the campaign team was held in Benin, Edo State with a decision to merge the rally of Bayelsa and Rivers States into one to be held in Port Harcourt.

Though the campaign team through the national youth leader of the party, Mr. Miriki Ebikibina, had recently confirmed the rally in Yenagoa slated for Tuesday but checks indicated that all the plans had been shelved due to the new arrangement of the rally in Port Harcourt.

Sources said the ACN leadership was being careful not to be given the treatment meted out to the Congress for Peoples Change (CPC) presidential candidate, General Muhammad Buhari, when stones and bottles were used to disrupt his rally in Yenagoa.

However, the chairman of the party in the state, Theodore Disouh, downplayed the security threat story, insisting that it was purely logistic problem that necessitated the movement of the rally from Yenagoa to Port Harcourt.

The Commissioner of Police, Bayelsa state, Alhaji Musa Aliyu said the police command was not aware of any security threat to the ACN and its presidential candidate in the state.

The Commissioner for Information, Orientation and Strategy, Mr. Nathan Egba said the Bayelsa state government had nothing to do with the rally, as it is not its duty to provide security for political rallies.'What may have happened was that the ACN and its Leadership considered the rally in Bayelsa State a waste as they know that all available votes will go to Jonathan' Egba added.