The Yoruba Council of Elders (YCE) and pan-Yoruba socio-cultural organisation, Afenifere, have urged political leaders to stop throwing tantrums at one another but focus on attacking issues besetting the country.
National Publicity Secretary of Afenifere, Jare Ajayi and Secretary-General of YCE, Oladipo Oyewole, gave the charge, yesterday, in separate messages to The Guardian in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital.
They expressed concern over the increasing verbal and physical attacks that are characterising election campaigns in various parts of the country.
Ajayi said that political parties and their candidates should focus on issues regarding how they will tackle the myriad of challenges that the country is facing rather than utterances and actions that border on “de-marketing of opponents and possibly causing bodily harms on other people.”
He noted that the verbal attacks emanating from some candidates and their spokespersons were encouraging their unscrupulous supporters to violently attack opponents in a manner that could result in bloodshed.
“Candidates and political parties that have good programmes to execute would not resort to verbal or physical attacks. We urge political parties and their candidates to focus on what plans they have to put an end or at least ameliorate the sufferings of Nigerians.
“They should let us know that they understand the enormity of the problems facing us and that they have solutions to these problems. An end should be put to mutual self-abuse either verbally or physically,” Ajayi further said.
Oyewole, on his own part, said: “Throwing tantrums will not grow the country. For us to make progress, the incoming president should focus on issues and not attacking personalities.”
