My car not involved in accident, am victim of blackmail- Lawmaker-elect

By Remi Koleoso

A House of Representatives member-elect, Mr Tunji Akinosi, says his car was never involved in an accident that purportedly knocked down a hawker on May Day in Lagos.

Akinosi, a member elected on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC) to represent Ado-Odo/Ota Federal Constituency, was also a Commissioner for Forestry in Ogun.

He made the clarifications in a statement, while reacting to a viral video accusing him of knocking down a hawker and broke his leg in an accident in Lagos on May Day.

According to him, the viral video was done in “bad taste and an attempt to smear my personality”.

Akinosi said he would have ordinarily ignored the post, “but as a Nigerian, there is need to put the issue straight, hence, my statement”.

He said: “There was no accident, not to talk of a clash.

“The first thing that should ordinarily come to our mind is that we are all Nigerians and more importantly, a lawmaker-elect, who should protect and defend the citizens before any other thing.

“I cannot oppress any citizen, but would rather protect such from any oppression.”

Recounting his ordeal, he said that there was traffic along the Onikan axis due to the May Day celebration.

“In an attempt to outwit each other, the hawkers were everywhere hustling and one of them ran into my car side mirror and damaged it.

“In his desperate bid to avoid being accused of damaging my car mirror, sensing the cost involved, the hawker fell down on his own, claiming that he had a broken leg.

“Before we know what was going on, some individuals had surrounded my car banging on it and asking me to come down that I had hit and wounded a hawker.

“But, I remained calm and told them that my driver was already attending to the matter,” Akinosi said.

According to him, thereafter, a lady just emerged from nowhere, shouting on top of her voice that she knows me and was trying to disclose my identity.

“However, when I noticed that the matter was becoming rowdy, I proposed two options for them, if they would not let me go.

“First, I told them the crowd, that they should let us go to the nearby police station to lodge a formal complaints and from there to the General Hospital, Onikan.

“I told that I am ready to foot all the bills, if the hawker is truly discovered to have a fractured leg.

“Then, secondly, I said if he is not diagnosed to have fractured as he claimed, that he will buy the complete set of my car side mirrors.

“Immediately he heard me saying this, the hawker jumped up and starting begging me to let him go and continue with his hawking, saying it was those people that told him to pretend as if he had a fractured leg,”he said.

Akinosi, however, advised the public to always be kind, gentle and reasonable in their actions to any incident, rather than creating a mob environment.

(NAN)