. APC guber candidate, Okpebholo hospitalised, police detail killed
Ben Ogbemudia
Edo State Deputy Governor, Rt. Hon. Comrade Philip Shaibu, on Thursday afternoon, escaped an assassination in Benin City, the state capital.
During the attack, a policeman attached to the All Progressives Congress governorship candidate, Senator Monday Okpebolo, was killed while three other Mobile police officers also attached to the APC flagbearer were seriously injured.
Okphebolo and other dignitaries were part of the crowd that went to the Airport to welcome Shaibu back to Benin, the state capital.
The APC governorship candidate has reportedly been admitted in an undisclosed hospital following the attack.
The alleged assassination attempt on Shaibu occurred barely a day after an Abuja Federal High Court overruled his impeachment by the state House of Assembly and ordered his reinstatement.
The attempt on the life of the newly reinstated deputy governor and other VIPs, including supporters who were at the Benin Airport to receive him, was carried out at the Airport exit gate roundabout, near Faith Mediplex in Benin.
It was learnt that no sooner had Okpebholo and Shaibu left the airport than unknown gunmen, positioned in a Sienna vehicle parked at the exit gate of the airport, began to fire shots at their convoy.
The attack, alleged to have been orchestrated by state-sponsored thugs and members of the Edo State Security Network (ESSN), witnessed sporadic shootings that left the cheering crowd who had come to welcome the reinstated deputy governor back to Benin, scampering for their dear lives to escape being hit by stray bullets.
It however took the efforts and intervention of security personnel to repel the alleged assailants and bring the situation under control, leaving the alleged state-sponsored thugs and local vigilantes to run away from the spot and give room to the rallying crowd to reconvene.
Sadly, police officer attached to the All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship candidate, Senator Monday Okpebholo, whose motorcade rode alongside the deputy governor’s convoy, lost his life in the unprovoked brutal attack, with several officers and supporters wounded.
Okpebholo’s Legislative in charge of Media & Communication, Godswill Inegbe, confirmed in a statement on Thursday evening that the APC governorship flagbearer had been admitted in a hospital for treatment following the shooting incident.
In the statement posted on several WhatsApp platforms, Inegbe said a policeman was killed by suspected political thugs who invaded the Benin Airport when the reinstated deputy governor, Philip Shaibu, and the APC governorship candidate arrived from Abuja.
The statement read, “This afternoon, the motorcade of Senator Monday Okpebholo, the APC governorship candidate, was brutally attacked by members of Edo State Security Network and State government-sponsored thugs.
“During the unprovoked brutal attack, three mobile policemen attached to the security detail of Senator Okpebholo were injured with bullet wounds, while one of the policemen has been declared dead
“Senator Monday Okpebholo is at this moment admitted in an undisclosed hospital in Benin receiving medical attention, and other members of his entourage who were victims of the brutalizing attack are in various hospitals in Benin City.”
But State Public Relations Officer, Chidi Nwabuzor, said they also heard about the shooting incident as a rumour.
He said it would be premature for the Command to make any statement on it without investigation.
