Stakeholders hold Violence-free elections rally in Lagos.

Stakeholders hold Violence-free elections rally in Lagos.

Stakeholders in Nigeria’s politics have urged people to shun violence and elect a credible leader as the president of Nigeria on Saturday.

At a political rally held in Lagos, by the Congress of political leaders, and attended by leaders of political parties, civil society groups, private sector participants, students and journalists, attention was focused on the  credibility of the election results  and  the challenges ahead of elected officials.

One of the opposition political parties in Nigeria, All Nigeria’s’ Peoples Party (ANPP), presidential candidate, Alhaji Ibrahim Shekarau, used the platform to urged Nigerians to shun violence and elect a credible leader as the president of the country.

These comments were made as the South West Coordinator of the Ibrahim Shekarau Campaign Organisation, Mr. Jamiu Ekungba, decried the political killings that heralded previous general elections nationwide.

Ensuring violence free elections

Ekungba said: “the bomb blasts on the eve of the National Assembly elections were one too many.’’

He said that the rally was very unique in its entirety, as it was aimed at mass change and peaceful elections.

The spokesman for CPL, Mr Austin Nnorom, said that the rally was organised to ensure that subsequent elections in the country were violence-free.

Also speaking, at the rally the National General Secretary of the Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC), Mr Lanre Adesope, advised Nigerians, especially the youth, not to allow themselves to be used by unscrupulous politicians.

``If we allow the spate of  violence nationwide to go unchecked, it would get to a point where Nigeria will become like other countries associated with bombings and reckless taking of human lives’’ he said.

The OPC scribe said that his group would do everything possible within its powers to ensure that subsequent elections were peaceful.

NAN/Williams/ Qasim