A British national Andrew Wynne has debunked the allegation of plotting to overthrow President Bola Tinubu’s administration.
The police declared him wanted on Monday, stating that he established a “bookshop and Stars of Nations Schools as a cover for his subversive activities.”
A Nigerian Lucky Obiyan, who has been described as an accomplice, was also declared wanted.
Also, the government arraigned 10 Nigerians who participated in last month’s #EndBadGovernance protest in Abuja. Part of the charges against them was that they collaborated with the 70-year-old Briton, “with intent to destabilise Nigeria” and that they “called on the military to take over the government from President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.”
The police earlier raided and sealed the Briton’s Iva Valley bookshop located at the Abuja headquarters of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC).
Mr Wynne, who spoke on Monday’s edition of Channels Television’s Politics Today from his base in the United Kingdom, said he was not aware he had been labelled a fugitive.
He said, “I am not aware that I am a fugitive. I am not aware that I am running away from the law. I have been visiting Nigeria for 25 years and have had a bookshop in the NLC office right in the centre of Abuja for seven years. All that time, of course, the security forces have paid no interest in me.
“I have always had one nationality. The name on my passport is Andrew Wynne and I operate with a nickname. I think it really started as differentiating in the sense of the broad political education work that I do with the bookshop.
“I am more than happy to talk to the police and have a discussion on WhatsApp or Zoom. I am more than happy to go to London and meet with officials from the Nigerian High Commission. If they want to start a conversation, then I think that is more than adequate.”
Wynne’s wife (names withheld), who also spoke on the programme, distanced her husband from the alleged terror act, saying the allegation was deliberately concocted to witch-hunt him.
