The Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has cautioned President Muhammadu Buhari and the All Progressives Congress not to mistake the alleged rigging in the Saturday’s governorship election in Ekiti State as acceptance by Nigerians.
The party declared as shameful for Buhari, who it said claimed to be an anti-corruption champion, to glee over what it described as acts of electoral corruption that it warned was capable of truncating the nation’s democratic process.
The PDP said it found as strange that Buhari could not condemn the alleged emasculation and subversion of the will of Ekiti people and the alleged stealing of another party’s victory by what it called brute force.
A statement signed by the National Publicity Secretary of the party, Mr. Kola Ologbondiyan, in Abuja on Monday, also said that the PDP noted the alleged unsavoury statements by the Presidency, celebrating the alleged subjugation of Ekiti people as a stamp for President Buhari, wherein it further boasted of a triumph for the President in the 2019 general elections.
He said, “If for President Buhari and the APC, the subjugation of the people, as witnessed in Ekiti, amounted to an election, then the nation is headed to a serious crisis, as such will be resisted with all legitimate force available within our laws in the defence of our nation’s democracy.
“The APC and the Independent National Electoral Commission must note that what happened in Ekiti, as a single state, cannot be pulled through in a general election, especially where the people have made up their minds to seek a new president.
“Nigeria is too big and too complex to be subjugated by a single individual or group of individuals, as any attempt to do so will definitely consume the conspirators.
“Moreover, while we are still pursuing the recovery of our stolen mandate in Ekiti, we state in very strong terms that this will be the last time the PDP will, under any circumstance whatsoever, allow itself to be manipulated out at the polls at any level. ”
He urged members and supporters of the PDP to continue to remain calm over the alleged daylight robbery that he said happened in Ekiti State, despite the alleged provocations by the APC and the Presidency.
He said that leaders of the party were already making efforts to ensure to redress the injustice that he said was meted to the party in Ekiti State.