Senior Special Assistant to Gov. Peter Obi on Media and Publicity, Valentine Obienyem, has called on the people of Anambra State to give thanks to God for sparing the life of Governor Peter Obi and to also pray for the repose of the souls of those that died from last Saturday’s Adoration Stampede at Uke.

In a statement released yesterday in Awka, the Anambra State capital, Obienyem said that it was obvious that Dr. Chris Ngige, the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate for the November 16 governorship election in the state, caused the stampede “by his childish antics of planting people wherever Obi goes to shout his name.”

According to Obienyem, “In the case of Uke Adoration tragedy, it was obvious those that disrupted the crusade were from the All Progressives Congress of Dr. Chris Ngige, because they were waving Ngige’s posters, banners and the symbol of his party, the broom.” He asked why they went with party materials to a prayer ground “as if they were at campaign.”

Thanking God for sparing the life of Obi, Obienyem said that the crowd there was unprecedented, well over 100,000 and that Obi, in his characteristic simplicity and humility, left quietly before the end of the crusade. He said there was the possibility that “those people were there for a special mission and might have searched for him after the crusade.”

Obienyem called on Ngige to behave himself and shed himself of what he called his “propensity for the gallery.”

According to the governor’s spokesman, “What is most despicable about Ngige is that he is always the aggressor, but wants to be seen as the victim. Look at how he and his supporters deface the billboards of Dr. Willie Obiano, but will always turn around and cry that they were the ones whose billboards are removed and defaced. He also goes about claiming Obi’s projects as his own and lying about everything without compunction. The man has character deficit that is disgusting and forbidding.”

•Photo shows Obienyem.