Trouble started when the lawmaker, who represents the council in the National Assembly while making a speech at the event announced a donation of N200,000 to augment efforts of the members and leaders across the ward levels in the council...
The lawmaker’s gesture angered many of the APC members, who rejected the money and disrupted the ceremony for what they termed “insult on them by the Reps member as if we are beggars.’’ The atmosphere was tense as Ogunnusi’s security aides made frantic efforts to whisk him away from the venue to save him from being attacked.
As they guarded him out of the vicinity, he was pelted with sachets of pure water by the rampaging youths. In the melee, chairs were broken and some party members and passers-by fled the area in different directions. One of the aggrieved APC members, who spoke with our correspondent(punch) shortly after normalcy returned to the venue, said it was not the amount of the money that angered the members but the manner it was offered.
He said, ‘‘Since election ended in 2011, Ogunnusi has refused to attend meetings in the local government, claiming he was busy with state matters in Abuja. He was avoiding us like a plague and now he came to woo us with N200,000 when election is approaching. He thinks we are beggars.’’
Another member, who gave her name as Kafayat, said, ‘‘What happened today is a proof that the electorate will no longer tolerate any member of the political class, who uses them during election and abandons them when he or she gets to position.”
Soji Akodu Asiwaju
