Akwa Ibom State Government has denied reports that it sent a hit squad after Senator Aloysius Etok of North-West Senatorial District.
In a statement by the Commissioner for Information and Communications, Mr. Aniekan Umanah, on Sunday, the state government said such allegations were baseless and mere hallucination.
State Governor Godswill Akpabio and Etok have lately been involved in a war of words over the bid of the governor to contest the Akwa Ibom North Senatorial election, which Etok currently occupies.
Umanah said Akpabio had no problem with Etok and would not join issues with anyone on the comments credited to the senator.
He said, “Governor Akpabio is a God-fearing and peace loving man, and has never and will never contemplate evil against anyone let alone his brother and friend, Senator Aloysius Etok.”
Umanah described the allegation of mobilising Local Government Chairmen and state lawmakers against the Senator as a figment of the imagination of the authors of such scripts.
He noted that the governor was not a party to the actions of the local government chairmen as well as the lawmakers as he was attending the Commonwealth Bar Association Conference in Cape Town, South Africa.
On the allegation of the governor “resurrecting a hit squad to fight Etok”, Umanah said, “For the avoidance of doubt, Akpabio has no hit squad and has never been after the life of any citizen of the state.”
But Etok on Sunday in Abuja dismissed his recent “appointment” as campaign manager for Akpabio as an “embarrassing joke”.
Akpabio had last week announced that Etok would serve as his campaign manager for the 2015 Senatorial election.
Etok, who has since declared his intention to re-contest the election, said the governor was merely attempting to demean his office.
He said the process of recall, which had begun with the collection of signatures of members of his community, was part of a grand design to distract him from the race.
Etok said, “All that (recall) is about 2015. It is part of the intimidation project and programme to make sure I don’t contest the 2015 Senatorial elections against the governor.”
On the 2015 elections, Etok said, “My people have not asked me not to go back to the Senate.”
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