By Jimitota Onoyume & Gbenga Oke

PORT HARCOURT—  Peoples Democratic Party, PDP and the All Progressives Congress, APC in Rivers State were, yesterday,  locked in a war of words over the postponement of the re-run elections scheduled for this Saturday by the Independent National Electoral commission, INEC.

The electoral body, in Abuja, yesterday, announced an indefinite postponement of the exercise citing last Friday’s arson on its temporary office in Bori, headquarters of Khana Local Government Area of the state, as an indication of unsafe atmosphere  for the exercise.

State Publicity Secretary of PDP, Mr Sam Wonosike, who spoke at the state secretariat of the party in Port Harcourt, said that the postponement did not come to the party as a surprise because the party had raised alarm over alleged plot by the electoral body to succumb to pressures from the APC to postpone the election.

He accused the APC of allegedly setting the INEC office in Bori on fire to create an atmosphere of insecurity for INEC to postpone the election. He said the APC was threatened by Governor Nyesom  Wike’s success of  so far, adding that they had to devise a means to ensure that the re-run election was postponed.

On its part, the APC, in a statement by its Publicity Secretary, Mr Chris Finebone, blamed the alleged violence on the PDP which caused the postponement. He said: “Indeed, we blame the postponement on the sustained violence and killings orchestrated by PDP in Rivers State.

“The latest of the string of violence the PDP has been perpetrating in the state is the burning down of INEC office in Bori last Friday, after Wike’s hate speech against INEC and APC leaders a few hours earlier at Okehi.

“Just before the March 19 re-run elections, Wike employed hate speech as his battle cry, calling on his followers to stop Senator Magnus Abe. Days later, the senator’s campaign office in Bori was bombed. Last Thursday, Wike was at his game once again.

Speaking at his party’s Rivers East PDP campaign rally at Okehi, Etche Local Government Area, Wike let out his usual battle cry and less than 24 hours later, those believed to be his foot soldiers bombed and burnt down the INEC office in Bori, the South-East senatorial zonal headquarters of Senator Abe.”