Rivers: Police warns political parties over security

The Rivers State Police Command has cautioned all political parties in the state to be careful of their actions and activities. The Commissioner of Police in the state, Tunde Ogunsakin gave the warning during a meeting between the police command and executive members of all the political parties in the state. Ogunsakin particularly made reference to the protests held by the two main parties in the state, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and the All Progressives Congress, APC. Ogunsakin said the command was unhappy that one of the political parties refused to inform the police about its protest. “I will emphasize that again. All demonstrations have political undertone. “There were two parties that demonstrated recently, incidentally one of the parties actually sought for permission while the other did not seek for permission. “And I will mention specifically, when there was procession by the APC, we allowed it because we didn’t want to start making it seem as if we are banning procession. “I stand to be corrected, the APC did not seek any permission, but before the PDP went on procession, they sought permission and then we recognized it. “That was why we decided to hold this meeting so that these issues can be adequately addressed”, he said. The Rivers State police chief, however, emphasized that the police need to be aware of any political activity in the state in other to avoid inter party crisis that would pose a threat to safety of innocent citizens of the state. “We don’t want a situation where political parties will go on procession on their own and then we will not know about it and then there will be crisis, there will be problems. “We are saying this for the umpteenth time. Henceforth, any political association, by whatever name if you want to go on procession, if you want to hold an association meeting that probably will include more than 50 to 100 people you must let us know. “We are not saying we will give you permit but we will give you security coverage and the coverage is to make sure that another party, another political association will not clash or have problems with you because when there is threat to life and property, we are concerned”, Ogunsakin warned. Representatives of some of the political parties expressed their thoughts at the meeting noting that the PDP and the APC were culpable of any political crisis in the state. About 25 political parties existing in Rivers State attended the meeting.