*Insists suspended senator an oppressor playing victim

Thousands of Kogi Central constituents have unanimously thrown their weights behind the ongoing recall process for the suspended Senator representing the District in the National Assembly, Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan, saying no amount of falsehood and propaganda can derail the process.

The constituents noted that it had become clear that her being in the Senate was an error, adding that they were determined to correct that error.

The over 10,000 constituents, from the five local government areas in Kogi Central, under the platform of Kogi Central Grassroots Movement, spoke in a statement, on Wednesday, signed by the Coordinator, Kogi Central Grassroots Movement, AbdulHameed Jimoh; and Secretary, Mohammed Abdullahi.

They accused the camp of the embattled Senator of fabricating videos and deliberately distorting information on the recall, but insisted that she had come to the end of her stay at the Senate.

The constituents advised Nigerians to ignore the rant of a few people on social media, but visit Kogi Central to see that “the embattled Senator is currently a paper-weight politician.”

“She (Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan) accused the state government of being behind her recall when she knows that even those who were her strong loyalists in the Central have abandoned her.

“She went to the National Assembly to pursue her personal interest, not the interest of Kogi Central.

“To worsen matters, she has turned herself to a laughing stock in the international community with the ridiculous allegations against the Senate President and her deliberate attempt to deceive the world that her suspension was as a result of the sexual harassment allegations,” they said.

The Kogi Central indigenes stated, “Senator Natasha has always been the oppressor playing the victim against the oppressed. Last weekend, she sent items to people in Okene to convince them to come out the next day for a protest.

“They imported people from outside the district to join her very few and reluctant aides and called them Kogi Central constituents.

“Yet, in their usual way of distorting facts, the embattled Senator and her team churned out orchestrated false media reports that people had been hoodwinked into signing the recall register aimed at recalling her from the Senate.”

According to them, keen observers of the whole shenanigans, since it broke out between Senator Natasha and the entire Senate, “will agree that the Kogi Central senator has put the Central Senatorial District in the eye of the storm for the wrong reasons again.”

“No reasonable constituents will fold their arms and see their senatorial district dragged to the mud without doing something to remedy it.

“The recall process therefore is a necessity and deliberate attempt by the people of Kogi Central to tell the whole world that they are not in support of the unruly behaviour of the senator. She should leave the stage to face her strange activism and quarrels so that we can have quality representation,” the statement said.

According to the constituents, the embattled Senator erred by going to IPU, UN to externalise what is purely a domestic issue, allegedly in a bid to embarrass the Federal Government of Nigeria.

“You can’t go and disgrace your country before the world and still continue to maintain leadership position. The best bet for her was to resign and since she is refusing to do that, the people are determined to show her the way out.

“We wish to call on the media to verify the narratives being pushed out by a few people who have decided to close their eyes to the numerous atrocious behaviours of Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan.

“We also reject the insults that thousands of people who thronged the various voting centres to sign up in the registers for the recall were either tricked with promise of empowerment or payment of cash.

“The electorate seen across the senatorial district participating in the exercise are too sophisticated to be deceived,” they maintained.

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