PDP Alleges Plots by Tinubu to Incite Nigerians, Disrupt Elections

• APC berates Atiku for ‘maintaining opportunistic silence on Naira sabotage’

Adedayo Akinwale in Abuja

The Atiku/Okowa Campaign Organisation has alleged that the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, of sending his campaign officials to unleash hate speech against prominent leaders in the North and other parts of the country in a desperate bid to incite Nigerians, cause insurrection and disrupt the 2023 general election.

But in a swift reaction, the Presidential Campaign Council (PCC) of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has said that the current sabotage of the Naira notes swap and fuel scarcity that have caused untold hardship to millions of Nigerians across the country revealed the true character of the presidential candidate of PDP, Atiku Abubakar, as public enemy number one.

The Spokesperson of Atiku/Okowa Campaign Organisation, Kola Ologbondiyan, in a statement issued yesterday decried how notable arrowheads and supporters of the Tinubu/Shettima Campaign have been moving around various media houses to spew hate speeches and promote blackmailing narratives apparently with the view to undermining national unity and derailing the electoral process.

He said Tinubu, who was heavily agonised by his looming defeat in the 2023 general election, having been rejected by Nigerians, has now resorted to incendiary statements as well as deploying top members of his campaign, including a serving governor, to insult and condemn prominent Nigerian leaders as a ploy to trigger crisis in the polity.

 The PDP campaign further alleged that such top officials of the Tinubu Campaign are also reportedly instructed to attack peaceful and well-meaning Nigerians, issue threats, incite mob actions, promote riots and violence in various parts of the country in furtherance of Tinubu’s unrelenting incitement to his followers to deploy violence, fight and snatch power by all means.

Ologbondiyan recalled how Tinubu recently in London declared to his followers that: “political power is not going to be served in a restaurant, it is not served a la carte. It is what we are doing; It is being determined; you do it at all costs; fight for it, grab it, snatch it and run with it.”

He also recalled how Tinubu during an APC campaign rally in Abeokuta, Ogun State, made very wild allegations, inciting his followers to see the February 25, presidential election as a “revolution”.

Ologbondiyan noted: “It is therefore not in doubt that having failed in every parameter of assessing a credible presidential candidate and having realised that he cannot win in the election, the APC presidential candidate is desperately seeking to cause anarchy, mayhem, bloodletting, violence and a forcible overthrow of our democratic system not minding the lives and safety of millions of Nigerians.

“It is clear that Tinubu is pathetically being driven by an entitlement mentality, and as such, he does not care about the unity of our country. 

“In any case, Tinubu had since announced that he does not believe in Nigeria as a nation. It is therefore obvious that he is in the presidential race for purposes that are not for the wellbeing of Nigerians; thus his readiness to set our nation on fire for his selfish purpose.”

He noted that it was however pitiable that a two-term governor, who has been spewing divisive insults on the leaders of the nation, could make himself a willing tool just because of personal aggrandizement.

PDP Campaign, therefore, called on Nigerians to be wary and firmly resist the evil machinations of the Tinubu Presidential Campaign against the nation.

It stressed that Tinubu and his co-travellers must come to terms with the reality that Nigerians across ethnic, religious and political divides have made up their minds to elect the Atiku as the next president and not even their predilections to violence, hate speech and blackmail can detract from this resolve.

Meanwhile, the APC PCC said the current sabotage of the Naira notes swap and fuel scarcity have caused untold hardship to millions of Nigerians across the country, while Atiku maintained a graveyard silence.

APC PCC Director, Media and Publicity, Bayo Onanuga, in a statement issued yesterday said while Atiku and PDP were in bed with the saboteurs and fifth columnists among the operators of Money Deposit Banks and oil marketers who created the current logjam to force the outcome of the February 25 presidential election in favour of the former Vice President, Atiku.

“Tinubu courageously pitched his tent with the poor masses who have been most negatively impacted by the antics of these evil doers,” Onanuga said.

He said having realised they had lost the initiative and their antics exposed to Nigerians by Tinubu at the APC Presidential Campaign rally in Abeokuta, Atiku made a half-hearted appeal to CBN to ‘slightly’ extend the deadline for the currency swap.

Onanuga said Nigerians would recall that since the CBN introduced its current cash-limit and new Naira notes swap policies, Atiku and PDP maintained opportunistic silence with the hope they would benefit from the discomfort the policies would create for Nigerians and the resentment they would generate for the ruling APC.

He noted: “We are currently at a loss to understand what informed the current call of Atiku on CBN not to extend the February 10 deadline despite the unmitigated hardship still being faced by many Nigerians who could not meet their basic daily needs as a result of lack of cash from banks and the empty ATM machines.

“Anyone who lives in Nigeria and not Dubai and visits banks and ATM locations will feel sad that the CBN is making our people suffer for its badly timed Naira swap policy.”

Onanuga stressed that the bank’s latest fire brigade approach in approving payment of N20,000 at the counter was far from offering relief as queues are still long, agony and frustrations widening, an invitation to riots.

According to him, “This poorly implemented policy has turned Nigerians to destitutes because they cannot access their own money in their bank accounts. People cannot get money to give their kids to school or pay for daily needs at corner shops, fruit shops, including buying newspapers. Transactions in market places have plummeted.”

Onanuga added that the CBN governor gave insight into the nature of the problem when he revealed in Daura last Sunday that out of the N3.3 trillion in circulation, only N500 billion was in the bank vaults, while only N1.9 trillion had been received by the banks for swap.

He said: “But people are not getting the new notes to spend, thus triggering the huge anger in the land against Emefiele.

“We thus find it ludicrous that a man who joined the call for an extension of the deadline last week is championing a new campaign against further extension because he feels the suffering of Nigerians will serve his own political ends to become president at all cost.”

Onanuga stressed that Atiku as a political leader disconnected from the Nigerian people that he was campaigning to govern, adding that living comfortably in Dubai for many years has drained Atiku of all empathy.

He stated: “This is a man who wants to be president and does not mind even if he presides over the graves of Nigerians as long as his inordinate ambition materialises in line with the prophecy of his marabouts.

“It is crystal clear to every Nigerian of conscience now that Atiku Abubakar and PDP do not mean well for our country. PDP and Atiku have become desperadoes who will wish calamity on the country as long as it makes them win an election they are destined to lose, spectacularly.

“Atiku is now public enemy number one in Nigeria. He is evil personified and must be rejected at the polls on 25 February.” The APC campaign pointed out that if Atiku has the poor people of the country at heart like Tinubu, the PDP candidate would not be advocating for adherence to a policy that has become a burden too heavy to bear for our people