All Progressives Congress (APC) has accused the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) of plotting to return the country to the era of election rigging.
It alleged that the opposition party planned to rig future elections, beginning with the coming governorship election in Osun State.
APC Acting National Publicity Secretary Yekini Nabena said in a statement yesterday that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and security agents should investigate PDP, to prevent election rigging.
He said a statement by the PDP directing PDP governors and presidential aspirants to move to Osun State and take part in the process of the governorship election was a call to anarchy and part of the strategies to actualise their plan.
PDP National Publicity Secretary Kola Ologbondiyan was quoted as saying that PDP would match APC’s rigging machine in future elections, adding that it would henceforth contend with APC, head to head, means to means, scheme to scheme, shenanigan for shenanigan, in all ramifications and magnitude, to discomfit them in the coming elections.
But the APC said the statement by the PDP spokesman coincided with its findings that the party was cloning PVC cards to be used to rig the September 22 governorship election in Osun State.
The APC statement reads: “The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on Tuesday vowed to deploy all ‘means, schemes, shenanigans in all ramification and magnitude’ to rig all coming elections, starting from the Osun State Governorship election. The party also ‘directed all its presidential aspirants to move all their political machinery to Osun State within this period’.
“When the All Progressives Congress (APC) learnt of the shocking disclosures, we initially doubted its veracity and dismissed it as one of the fake news in circulation, until further checks backed by media reports confirmed that the statement was indeed issued by the PDP National spokesman, Kola Ologbondiyan.
“The PDP’s statement on Tuesday is particularly worrisome because it coincided with the situation field report we received of the PDP cloning Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) for use in the Osun governorship election.
“PDP’s public rigging plan is a red flag that requires urgent probe by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and relevant security agencies. We also call on well-meaning Nigerians and civil society organisations to speak out and resist the PDP’s retrogressive plan, which threatens our democracy.
“Perhaps the PDP needs to be reminded that our democracy is maturing and its crude election rigging methods, such as ballot box snatching (recently displayed during last weekend’s by-election in Kogi State), announcement of concocted election results and other anomalies are no longer acceptable in our elections.
“We are confident that the good people of Osun will resist the PDP’s deployment to take over the state by force. The people’s will; the people’s vote is supreme. It must be respected and defended. That is democratic, progressive and the right thing.
“We conclude by reminding the PDP of new realities as succinctly captured by President Muhammadu Buhari, ‘…the old Nigeria is slowly but surely disappearing and a new era is rising…’. Unlike undemocratic practices under past administrations, elections under the APC administration are increasingly freer and fairer — a very significant feat in our march for lasting and representative democracy.”
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