Women Affairs Minister attacked by crowd she rented—Ishaku

Alhassan

Taraba State government has said Saturday’s attack on the convoy of Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development, Aisha Alhassan, by suspected hoodlums during Takum I assembly election was a fallout of alleged disagreement over unpaid bill by the minister.

Governor Darius Ishaku, who spoke through his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Bala Dan-Abu, at a briefing in Jalingo, urged the minister to exclude the governor and Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, from her predicament.

He said: “What we discovered was that the attack was done from within her party and her group. She brought some people from Gombe and Bauchi states as part of her rented crowd because she knows she was not going to get any support from Takum.

“Unfortunately, that business relationship was mismanaged because she failed to pay members of the crowd that she brought. What we saw in the form of attack, as she claimed to have suffered, was a revolt by her own group, the rented crowd that she brought into Takum.”

Govt’s claim ridiculous, laughable—Minister

However, reacting at a separate briefing, the minister described the state government’s allegation as ridiculous, saying “anybody that knows me can attest to the fact that I don’t do politics of thuggery, because I am a mother and will never pray that my children become political thugs and will likewise not take another person’s child as a political thug.

“The election was not yet concluded when they attacked me. So it couldn’t have been me not paying them after working for me and they attacked me in revolt.

“This is a very big lie, because the attack could have happened after the election. So it is a laughable defence on the part of the government.”