The Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has said the postponement of the elections was part of the All Progressives Congress, APC’s plan to thwart the will of Nigerians no matter the cost.
It also noted that the decision has exposed the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, as a failure and called on the Chairman of the Commission, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu to immediately resign.
National Chairman of the party, Uche Secondus, posited that the shoddy arrangement for the election by the electoral body was “a deliberate, pre determined agenda of President Muhammadu Buhari to cling on to power even when it’s obvious to him that Nigerians want him out.”
He warned that the party would not accept anything short of a well organized election devoid of manipulation, harassment and intimidation of voters and the opposition particularly members of the PDP.
In a statement signed by his Special Assistant on Media, Ike Abonyi, the PDP leader said; “Having failed in all their nefarious options to enable them cling on to power, the APC and the INEC came up with the idea of shifting election, an action that is dangerous to our democracy and unacceptable.
“The APC in connivance with the INEC have been trying all options including, but not limited to burning down INEC offices in some states and destroying of electoral materials to create artificial problems upon which to stand for their dubious act.”
Secondus claimed that the party was privy to all the pressures from the APC and the federal government to arm twist the INEC, to dance to their new strategy after their earlier ones failed.
“With several of their rigging options failing, they have to force INEC to agree to a shift in the election or a staggered election with flimsy excuses pre manufactured for the purpose.
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“For the avoidance of doubt the PDP sees this action as wicked and we are also aware of other dubious designs like the deployment of hooded security operatives who would be ruthless on the people ostensibly to scare them away,” he said.
The National Chairman recalled that the PDP had earlier alerted Nigerians that the APC was coming up with lined up rigging strategies including burning down of INEC offices and engineering crisis in PDP strong hold areas to scare away the people.
He also drew the attention of Nigerians to the statement of President Muhammadu Buhari on the international media that nobody could unseat him from office as an indication of what he wanted to do.
Prince Secondus also regretted that President Buhari who made a promise at the signing of the peace accord that the election will be conducted in a fair and transparent atmosphere has gone ahead in breach of the peace agreements to send soldiers and other security agencies to arrest, harass and intimidate opponents in Rivers, Akwa Ibom, Kwara, Kano, Kaduna states.
