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From Priscilla Ediare, Ado Ekiti
Ahead of the June 18 governorship election in Ekiti State, some teachers who were allegedly ordered by the state’s Teaching Service Commission (TESCOM) to surrender their voters’ cards to be used for an easy win by the All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship candidate, Mr Biodun Abayomi Oyebanji (BAO), have told TESCOM that they were ready for sack rather than surrender their voters’ cards.
Some of the teachers who spoke with Mr Idowu Adelusi, the spokesperson of Build Back Better, an international Pan Ekiti Movement, campaigning for the election of Asiwaju Segun Oni, the governorship candidate of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) in the forthcoming poll in the state, last Saturday, in Ado Ekiti, said that they were ready for the worse from the Kayode Fayemi administration.
The teachers, who frowned at the silent attitude of the Nigerian Union of Teachers (NUT) over the matter, said: ‘If the NUT cannot protect us from the big stick of the APC-led government which has threatened us with dismissal from service if we refuse to cooperate with the APC rigging agenda, we also are ready for the worse from the Kayode Fayemi administration.
‘Our voters’ cards are our weapon to vote out tyrannical, clueless, incompetent and oppressive APC government in Ekiti, only death can snatch the voters’ cards from us. We are ready for victimization, demotion, indiscriminate transfer and sack. The action of the APC to collect people’s voters’ cards is an indication that the party doesn’t believe in a free and fair election to get to power.
‘This political harassment on the part of government smacked self-defeating attitudes when the election is still more than three months away.’
The teachers continued: ‘If the APC government has already accepted defeat, we will rather agree to be sacked, but vote according to our conscience and then come back to our jobs with a new government in October 2022.
‘But the question we are asking is, when did the education officers become politicians and agents of the APC? As teachers, we still know our rights to vote for the political parties and candidates of our choice. In a situation where the teachers are treated without honour, dignity and respect, where their statutory rights and benefits are not given, the election time is a good payback time and we shall not shy away from it.
‘We know our true friends and we know the fake sympathizers. That the father and mother of BAO were said to be teachers is not a sufficient reason that his administration will be teachers’ friendly. What has he done for teachers when he had the opportunities? We know our friends and that is who we have decided to vote for on Saturday, June 18, 2022.
‘Please, nobody should harass us. we deserve to be respected as fellow stakeholders in the Ekiti political affairs. No sacrifices are too great to be paid by using our votes to liberate Ekiti from her political neo-colonialists.’
