Diri Sends Strong Warning To ‘Trouble Makers In Bayelsa State

By Admin

The Governor of Bayelsa State, Douye Diri, has declared that his government will not tolerate any attempt by anyone or group to disrupt the peace in the State.

The Governor warned that his government will not allow anyone to take laws into their hands.

Governor Diri made the declaration on Thursday when he paid an assessment visit to the scene of property destroyed after the Supreme Court judgment which brought him into office.

The governor accused the National Chairman of All Progressives Congress (APC), Adams Oshiomhole and the Minister of State for Petroleum, Chief Timipre Sylva, of sponsoring the violence which greeted the Supreme Court judgement.

Scenes visited by the Governor and his team included the home of the immediate past Governor of the State, Seriake Dickson, Steve Azaiki public library, PDP Secretariat, Governor Diri’s private home, radio Bayelsa and others.

He said: “Because of what the APC national chairman said in Abuja where he declared that the Supreme Court which is the apex court in the land, having given the ruling, that it will not stand, and declared that there will be no governor in Bayelsa State, that was what ignited protest back home here".

“APC is always associated with violence, you recalled that two days to my election, I went to campaign in Nembe Local Government, and we were attacked just to go and campaign, and we lost about 20 of our party faithfuls, and here on the 13th February, after the apex court had given their judgement, PDP faithfuls were visited on their own property".

“Radio Bayelsa is the public property of Bayelsa State, so assuming the APC were governors, wouldn’t they use the same Radio Bayelsa, the judiciary is the property of Bayelsa State, assuming they were governors, wouldn’t they go to Court, and then they now picked PDP strong supporters and faithfuls, they visited Steve Azaiki library, when you see the level of destruction there, you begin to wonder, even at war, there are certain places that are marked as sacred, churches, schools, libraries are not touched.

“But you begin to wonder if these people are from the Stone Age, a library was touched to that level, I am short of weeping and crying for our state, Bayelsa".

“If we value these projects, we are talking of millions of naira, money that we would ordinarily use for development and for the empowerment of our youths and our women, scarce resources that we don’t have now, we need to now cut out for Radio Bayelsa to operate, for judiciary to operate and of course for others whose property were damaged”.

“Even after I have been sworn-in, the Minister of State for Petroleum, who is the leader of APC in the State, after making a statement that was very suspicious to most of us, when he called for calm, declared that the governor of Bayelsa State is illegitimate, and when a man who is occupying such an exalted position makes such a statement, what do you expect from the followers, it’s the damages we have seen", he said.