#ResumeOrResign: Presidency Reacts to Attack on Charly Boy, Others in Wuse Market, Abuja

Pro-Buhari protesters

 

The Presidency on Wednesday, reacted to the protests that rocked Wuse market in Abuja by popular musician, Charly Boy, describing it as 'ethnicised' and selfish. 

The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, who addressed a pro-Buhari group from the Niger-Delta region which staged a separate rally in Abuja on Wednesday, to counter the #ResumeOrResign protesters, reacted to the protests that rocked Wuse market in Abuja describing it as ‘ethnicised’ and selfish.

 

The Presidency on Wednesday also criticised the #ResumeOrResign group led by Charles Oputa, popularly called Charly Boy, for taking the protests - calling for the resumption or resignation of the president - to a sensitive spot like the Wuse market.

 

On Wednesday, dozens of pro-Buhari protesters gathered at the Unity Fountain at about 10 a.m. on Wednesday and concluded their rally with a solidarity march to the junction of Presidential Villa where they were received by the presidential media aide and his colleague, Garba Shehu.

 

The protesters were chanting ‘Sai Baba Sai Baba’ and were accompanied by security operatives down to the Presidential Villa where they demonstrated their support for Buhari.

 

Femi Adesina, while addressing the protesters on behalf of the presidency, condemned the Wuse market protests, and when quizzed on why Charly Boy was attacked on Tuesday, he said what happened was an attempt to ‘ethnicise the protest.’

 

“We are not for ethnic cleavages, we are for one Nigeria. Anybody that attempted to ethnicise protests failed. Because everyone has a right to protest and ethnicity is not something that should be introduced to protest.

“Taking a protest to the market in the first place was wrong, so whoever took the protest to the market place was the one that attempted to make it get out of hand,” he added.

 

Adesina added that the presidency noticed that “some people have made efforts to create ethnic cleavages in the country but that what the people from the Niger Delta region did today has reinforced faith that Nigeria will remain one.”

 

He said the message of his audience would be conveyed to Buhari. “Just over the weekend we were with him in London and he told us that he has been following events at home very keenly. We want to thank you very much and urge you to keep this spirit of patriotism. This is our country, we have no other one. Whatever we make of it, is what we get,” Adesina added.