As the 2019 general elections fast approaches, the All Progressives Congress (APC) has watched with consternation how the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the last couple of weeks has elevated falsehood and crying wolf into an ignoble art.
Nigerians have also watched in disbelief how the PDP without proof has consistently and vehemently pilloried state institutions performing various roles in the coming general elections.
From security agencies to our election management body, the PDP has spared none its barefaced lies. On a daily basis, the PDP has invented one lie after the other to discredit state institutions in the eyes of Nigerians and the international community. PDP’s ignoble actions are unhealthy for our electoral processes and a threat to our maturing democracy.
The PDP’s game plan is simple: Discredit the entire process before, during, and after the elections in order to make the final outcome a “nullity” in its own jaundiced eyes.
The PDP must understand that all registered political parties are equal stakeholders in the coming elections; hence the PDP’s tired narrative that the entire election process is skewed against it should be seen for what it is – PDP’s admittance of defeat.
The era of sham elections are behind us. The records of credible elections conducted since the APC took over the country’s governance are public knowledge compared to selections, impositions and fraudulent elections under the PDP.
We will continue in our progressive tradition in ensuring that elections are free, peaceful credible and every vote counts — The wishes of the electorate must prevail in all elections.
Against this backdrop, we urge INEC and other state institutions responsible for different election duties to remain firm and focussed in the discharge of their legitimate roles. They must not be stampeded into taking actions that run contrary to the Constitution and the Electoral Act.
Our free advice to the PDP is that it concentrates its energy to resuscitate its floundering campaign, which has seen majority of its governors tacitly and openly avoid supporting the presidential bid of the PDP candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.
Again, in the wake of the recent Reuters report that Atiku visited the US two weeks ago thanks to heavily paid lobbyists who aided the temporary suspension of a travel ban linked to decade-old bribery scandals and corruption indictments, we urge Atiku to come clean to Nigerians on his problems. This is the least he owes an electorate he wishes to lead.
SIGNED:
Mallam Lanre Issa-Onilu
National Publicity Secretary
All Progressives Congress (APC).
