The Willie Obiano Campaign Organisation has cried out over the destruction and defacing of the campaign billboards, posters and other below-the-line publicity materials of Chief Willie Obiano, the APGA candidate for the November 16 Anambra gubernatorial election, by agents alleged to be working for the APC candidate, Senator Chris Ngige.

“Feelers from the monitoring exercise mounted by the Willie Obiano Campaign Organisation have revealed that this highly co-ordinated destruction of Obiano’s campaign materials is allegedly carried out in the dead of the night by a Special Squad set up by the APC wing in Anambra State to sabotage the growing influence and approval of Chief Obiano in the state,” a statement from the Obiano camp said.

Nze Obed Okwuosa, an official of the Willie Obiano Campaign Organisation, put their losses at over N50 million. He said that no single board was spared “especially in the Idemmili area where they tore down everything while those not torn were defaced. Even boards in the state capital were not spared.”

According to Nze Okwuosa, “We have it on good authority that the operations are carried out with high level of sophistication by paid hirelings protected by armed thugs. We are afraid that the peace we have enjoyed all along in this state even in the early days of the election campaign has been fast eroded. No thanks to the desperation of some cutthroat politicians who want to take over Anambra State by any means necessary.”

Nze Okwuosa lamented that efforts by his team to replace the destroyed flex materials have not been easy because of the frequency of occurrence and the level of organisation of the vandals behind the destruction.

“Why would any sane person resort to these crude tactics if not to ferment trouble?” he asked, adding: “We have known Senator Ngige’s destructive approach to politics since the past ten years and it is too late now to expect a positive change from him. APGA and Willie Obiano stand for peace and we have refused their bait. We take solace in the fact that Ndi Anambra know the culprits. They also know that the destruction of Billboards cannot stop our collective march to greatness from November 16, this year.”

Nze Okwuosa disclosed that the attention of the police and the electoral authorities has been drawn to the growing spate of destruction, leading to the arrest of two young men who were caught in the act and who had also confessed that they were acting on instruction.

•Photo shows APGA candidate Obiano.