President Muhammadu Buhari is allowing a former governor of the state, Timipre Sylva, and the Minister of State for Agriculture, Senator Heineken Lokpobiri, to undermine the security of Bayelsa State, governor Henry Seriake Dickson said on Friday.
He also expressed shock that the President has failed to take any drastic action against leaders of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and their allies who cause mayhem in the state despite making several reports and complaints to him and the security agencies.
Dickson in a statement by his Special Adviser on Public Affairs, Daniel Alabrah, The governor accused the APC leaders in the state, including Sylva and Lokpobiri of using the security agencies to shield criminals, intimidate and harass innocent citizens..
He said: “The President has allowed common criminals and terrorists such as Sylva and Lokpobiri to unleash violence on their people while the Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris is sitting in Abuja to direct investigation of a petition against the Brass Council chairman.
“At the moment, they are attacking innocent people in Brass, who are members of the PDP, with people bloodied and houses burnt all in a bid to destabilise the state.”
He also accused the legislator representing the Brass Constituency 1 in the state House of Assembly, Israel Sunny-Goli, of being responsible for the mayhem in Brass.
The governor said the legislator was being shielded by Sylva and Lokpobiri in collaboration with security agencies.
Dickson called for the arrest and prosecution of the lawmaker for various crimes, including murder, thuggery and cultism in his constituency and the whole of Brass Local Government Area.
Governor Dickson said if Sunny-Goli is not arrested and prosecuted by the law enforcement agencies, he would personally mobilise the people of the state to arrest him.
He stressed that the police authorities and the Department of State Services (DSS) had failed to arrest the lawmaker despite the plethora of petitions against him in the state because he belonged to the APC.
According to him, Sunny-Goli was one of the kingpins of cultism in the state responsible for several unresolved murders.
“Sunny-Goli is a criminal and a fugitive, who is running away from the law. He is responsible for several deaths in the state and runs to Abuja to seek refuge. The police authorities cannot continue to condone acts of criminality simply because Sunny-Goli (also known as Adi) is a member of the APC. The law must not be applied selectively.
“The position of the Bayelsa State Government is that Sunny-Goli has to be arrested. We are asking the IG and the DSS to take steps to prevent an abuse of their powers by someone who terrorises innocent people.
“I will mobilise the people of this state to arrest him since the law enforcement agencies cannot do it. As governor of this state, I do not and will not condone criminal acts by any individual no matter his position in the state. I have a zero tolerance for criminality and lawlessness.”
Dickson said Sunny-Goli has several pending cases before the police and the DSS for which he was invited but that he shunned the invitation to seek protection in Abuja from where he wrote a frivolous petition that resulted in Thursday’s invasion of the homes of the interim chairman of the Brass council, Victor Isaiah, and that of the former chairman of the APC in the state, Chief Timipa Tiwei Orunimighe, who recently defected to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
He insisted that Isaiah who was invited by the police would honour the invitation when the security agencies act on the earlier petitions against the lawmaker that was being protected by the agencies.
