I didn’t sponsor thugs to snatch ballot boxes, says Semenitari

A former Acting Managing Director of the Niger Delta Development Commission (NDDC), Mrs. Ibim Semenitari, has denied a report on Radio Rivers she sponsored armed thugs that stormed polling units in Abam, Okrika Local Government Area of Rivers State during the governorship and House of Assembly elections.

Semenitari, who is a former Rivers Commissioner for Information and Communications during the Rotimi Amaechi’s administration, was accused by the Port Harcourt-based radio of mobilising the thugs to snatch electoral materials, which they allegedly took to her family house in Abam, Okrika LGA to thumb-print for her party.

She is a member of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Mrs. Semenitari, whose husband, Chief Henry Semenitari, is the paramount ruler of Abam community, stated that she had suffered embarrassment by the false report.

She said: “At no time did thugs come to my house. I do not harbour any thug and I cannot imagine such a report being aired about me.

“The reporter did not do a simple fact-check, before going on air. Neither did the radio station.”

Soldiers later went to Chief Abam’s house, a PDP chieftain and recovered the hijacked electoral materials.

The former acting managing director of NDDC is a daughter of an ex-Deputy Governor of Rivers state, Sir Gabriel Toby, who hails from Opobo, the headquarters of Opobo/Nkoro LGA.