APC blasts DSS for linking party
with Boko Haram! sues Marilyn
Ogar.
The All Progressives Congress (APC) has
condemned the thinly-veiled attempt by the
Directorate of Security Service (DSS) to link the
party with the insurgent group Boko Haram,
without providing a shred of evidence to that
effect, and called on the agency’s spokesperson
Marilyn Ogar to resign or be fired.
In a statement issued in Ilorin on Saturday by its
National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed,
the party also said it has decided to sue Ogar for
attempting to blame the APC for the series of bomb
blasts in the country, to give her the opportunity to
present whatever evidence she may have of the APC
‘s complicity in a court of law.
It said the DSS threw caution to the wind and
exhibited its crass partisanship when the agency’s
spokesperson, Ogar, said on national television that
anytime the APC wins an election, there is no bomb
blast, but that whenever other parties win, there is
always a bomb blast.
”That this incredulous accusation could be made by
the spokesperson of a security agency, without
providing a scintilla of evidence to support such
claim, has confirmed our fears that the nation’s
security agencies have now constituted themselves
into the enforcement arm of the PDP.
”For the DSS Spokesperson to echo the same
capricious statement that has been made in the past
by the spokesman of the PDP shows that the agency
has dropped its toga of non-partisanship and has
descended into the political fray.
If the DSS has any professional ethics, if DSS is not an
arm of the PDP, then the agency must publicly
dissociate itself from the irresponsible and
unfounded allegation by Ogar and disengage her
from the service.
”Doing that will be the first step in restoring the
credibility, or whatever is left of it, of the DSS. In the
alternative, we challenge the DSS to present to
Nigerians any evidence it may have linking our party
to the spate of bomb blasts in the country. After all,
it is trite that he who alleges must prove,” APC said.
The party said since the APC won the election in
Osun, Ogar has been struggling hard to discredit the
party and its victory, including making a spurious
allegation that the party offered the DSS 14 million
naira as a bribe and also trying to make a joke of the
arrest of the party’s spokesman, Alhaji Lai
Mohammed, for no other reason than that he
belongs to the opposition.
”Institutions of state like the DSS must know that
their responsibility is to the nation, not to any
political party that may be having a transient hold on
power, that their loyalty is to the nation, not to any
individual. This way, the institutions will keep their
integrity intact and also serve the nation properly.
Irrespective of the government in power, institutions
of state must stay above the fray, in line with best
practices.
”This is a lesson that should not be hard for the
fellows over there at the DSS to understand, going by
the antecedents of their agency.
However, where they choose to play politics with
their professionalism and integrity, they will soon
realize there are working in an agency that is not
worth its salt, one that has lost the respect of the
citizenry,” it said.
APC called on the National Assembly to invite the
Director-General of the DSS to explain if Ogar’s
partisan stance represents the official position of the
service on the spate of bomb blasts in the country; if
indeed 14 billion Naira was offered as a bribe to the
DSS and by who; and why the DSS has chosen to
descend to the political fray at the expense of its
professionalism and national loyalty.
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