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Fuel price hike: Protests rock Benin,
Ibadan
•Plan to arrest Oshiomhole unveiled
MALACHY UZENDU, Abuja, VINCENT
ADEKOYE, Benin, WALE FOLARIN, Ibadan, RAYMOND GUKAS,
Maiduguri
POLICE authorities said yesterday
that President of Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC), Mr. Adams Oshiomhole, might be
"placed on protective custody" in a bid to truncate, Labour’s plan to
effectively direct the planned October 11 protest over fuel price hike.
The police plan came to light yesterday at the Abuja High
Court at the resumed hearing into the James Onanefe Ibori ex-convict saga even
as bottled-up emotion over the fuel price matter ruptured, yesterday, when
protests, involving mainly students, rocked Benin, the Edo State capital and
Ibadan, the Oyo State capital.
But in Ondo State, precautionary measures
were taken as mobile policemen were deployed to strategic government
establishments to forestall possible break down of law and order by aggrieved
persons.
Speaking at the Abuja High Court, through
his lawyer, Mr Wole Aina, Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Mr Tafa Balogun,
stated that rather than allow the NLC disrupt public peace on October 11,
"Comrade Oshiomhole would be placed in protective custody."
The statement arose in the course of a
pronouncement made by Chief Gani Fawehinmi (SAN), leading counsel to Messrs
Goodnews Goodman Agbi and Anthony Alabi, two Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)
chieftains in Delta State, who had alleged that Gov. James Onanefe Ibori of
Delta State, was convicted by the Bwari Upper Area Court in 1995.
Chief Fawehinmi had urged Justice Husseini
Mukhtar, who is presiding over the trial to ascertain the true identity of the
James Onanefe Ibori who was convicted by the lower court, that the nation would
be grounded by October 11 because the NLC would be asking workers out to embark
on mass action over the recent fuel price increase.
Fawehinmi spoke while opposing that the
matter be adjourned to October 11 as proposed by Dr. Alex Izinyon (SAN),
pointing out that the NLC had resolved to challenge "President Obasanjo’s
respressive regime."
Mr. Aina, who entered appearance to defend
the IGP in the proposed contempt proceeding commenced by Governor Ibori against
the Police Chief’s inability to produce certain police documents to be used in
the trial, declared that rather than kill Oshiomhole or anybody over the
protest, the NLC president might be kept in police custody.
Justice Mukhtar adjourned further hearing
on the Ibori matter to October 4 this year.
In Benin, students gave the Federal
Government up to next Thursday to roll back the latest price hike or they would,
in liaison with their colleagues elsewhere, make the country ungovernable.
Apart from causing panic and fear in the
city, the irate students who paralysed activities at the office of Gov. Lucky
Igbinedion, chased uniformed policemen to their barracks and took over the
streets of the city, Ekpoma and Auchi.
The students, who were armed with 10 mock
coffins and placards, came from the University of Benin, (UNIBEN), Ambrose Alli
University (AAU), Ekpoma, and Auchi Polytechnic, simultaneously held residents
of the towns hostage from 8.00a.m till about 1.30p.m during the protests.
Reports said Auchi Polytechnic has
consequently been shut.
The UNIBEN students numbering over 5,000
loaded themselves into some commercial buses and trucks allegedly hijacked along
the Benin-Lagos road and demonstrated through the major streets, thereby forcing
many business owners to close shop.
At the governor’s office, the protesting
students who initially refused to be addressed by the state Deputy Governor,
Chief Mike Ogiadomhe, called on the Federal Government to cancel any activity
planned for the October 1 Independence Day in the interest of peace.
In a two-page address delivered by the
president of the UNIBEN Students’ Union Government (SUG), Mr. Ekiyor Christopher
Peres, the student said, "there is no acceptable justification for the incumbent
government to impose a hike of more than 100 per cent on helpless Nigerians,
moreso when our economy has virtually collapsed."
Said he: "The entire University of Benin
students have therefore vowed to make the country ungovernable by urgently
declaring Operation Total Paralysis (OTP) come independence anniversary
and will not hesitate to link our comrades in the struggle throughout the
country in our determination to embark on the permanent struggle for the
emancipation of Nigerians from the shackles and manacles of oppression,
suppression, deprivation and all forms of injustice emanating from the present
inhuman, vexatious and capricious policies of the current administration.
"Finally, we hereby give the Federal
Government up to the eve of the independent anniversary to reverse the price to
the status quo ante or we shall embark on
Operation Total Paralysis."
Responding, Deputy Governor, Chief
Ogiadomhe promised to convey the message of the students, to the Federal
Government.
The students were armed with about 10 mock
coffins and placards throughout the protest.
Meanwhile, Auchi Polytechnic has been
closed down as a result of the students protests.
Students of the Polytechnic has protested
also on Monday over the mysterious death of one of their course mates who gave
up the ghost after he was caught by a lecturer, while cheating in examination
hall.
In Ibadan, irate students of the
University of Ibadan (UI) took to the streets protesting the hike.
The students who embarked on the peaceful
protest from as early as 7.00am, beat scores of anti-riot policemen who had kept
vigil at the main entrance of the university apparently to prevent the students
from carrying out the protest outside the campus, when they went through the
university’s gate and boarded some vehicles already positioned there.
Chanting various war songs, the students
moved round major streets in Ibadan calling on the people to resist the recent
hike in fuel price.
The students were seen carrying placards
with different inscriptions such as "No to incessant increment in prices of
petroleum products," "No to deregulation and privatisation of the oil sector,"
"We say no to commercialization of education", "No to school fees" and "No to
IMF, World Bank dictates in our economy".
In a leaflet which was circulated by the
students, they accused the Federal Government of waging war on the masses
through an alleged anti-masses, anti-labour and anti-student policies.
"Since the assumption of office, Obasanjo
has subjected Nigerians to dreadful hardship. Deregulation of the downstream
sector is a conspiracy of the bourgeoise class against Nigerian masses", they
said.
They also asked the Federal Government to
explain how the excess from sales of crude oil is being spent.
Anti-riot policemen were deployed to
strategic locations in Ondo State to forestall protesters from damaging the
buildings.
Daily Champion
investigations in Akure yesterday revealed that the policemen
are now keeping vigil at various government-owned establishments.
Hot spots within the metropolis are now
also under security watch as part of measure to abort a planned mass rally on
October 11.
State Police Public Relations Officers (PPRO),
Mr. Aremu Adeniran said that the command took the measure to protect law abiding
citizens and public buildings.
But State Secretary of National Union of
Road Transport Workers (NURTW), Alhaji Abdulrasheed Mohammad, said the decision
of drivers to join the planned mass rally, would be taken by its national
leadership.
Further support came for the NLC in its
bid to force government to go back on the price hike with former National
chairman of All Peoples Liberation Party (APLP), Alhaji Muhammadu Maizabura
calling on Nigerians to back Labour’s planned action.
According to Alhaji Maizabura, the fight
is not for NLC but all Nigerians because from all indications, the government
has no interest of the people at heart."
He urged all Nigerians to remain indoors
at the end of the 14-day ultimatum, if government refused to withdraw the price
hike.
Nigerians, he said, have never had it so
bad.
The former presidential aspirant under the
defunct Social Democratic Party (SDP) added that Nigerians should know what
government is doing with the excess crude oil proceeds.
Nigerians, he said, should fast and pray fervently for
divine intervention in the country’s affairs.
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