Presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, has appealed to the people of Lagos State to be calm and eschew any act that can lead to the breakdown of law and order.
His appeal followed his shocking defeat in Saturday’s election in Lagos by the Labour Party’s Peter Obi and reported attacks on Igbos in the state.
The election tally showed that Obi’s LP polled 582,454 votes while Tinubu’s APC got 572,606 votes.
The result sent shock waves across Nigeria as it showed that Tinubu’s e
stranglehold on Lagos has been broken and that more danger looms ahead for the APC in the forthcoming gubernatorial elections.
Violence against Obi’s ethnic brethren broke out in parts of Lagos as Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu called for calm.
Reacting to reports of the attacks, Tinubu said the election should not be a source of provocation, adding that the beauty of democracy is that people have a right to vote for the candidate of their choice.
The APC candidate further said in a statement issued on Monday by the signed by the Director of Media and Publicity of the APC Presidential Campaign Council, Mr. Bayo Onanuga, that as a democrat he is bound to accept the outcome of any election whether favourable or not.
Tinubu expressed serious concern over reports of violence against some traders of Igbo origin in parts of the state.
Tinubu, a former Lagos State, condemned any form of violence against people of any ethnic group in Lagos.
He said: “The fact that the APC narrowly lost Lagos State to another party should not be the reason for violence. As a democrat, you win some, you lose some. We must allow the process to continue unhindered across the country while we maintain peace and decorum.”
