The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Tuesday accused the All Progressives Congress (APC) of being behind the burning of offices of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in various parts of the country.
PDP National Publicity Secretary Kola Ologbondiyan made the position known in a statement issued in Abuja.
He restated the party’s position that the APC has “been promoting acts of violence including burning of INEC offices in other to build up an emergency situation and frustrate the smooth conduct of the 2023 general elections.
“It is despicable that having realised that it has no place in the 2023 election, given its abysmal failure in governance, APC leaders are seeking to set our country ablaze and truncate our hard-earned democracy.”
PDP urged Nigerians to “note the failure of the APC and its leaders to forcefully condemn this clear assault on our frontline institution of democracy. This is also as the APC administration has failed to take decisive steps to protect INEC facilities from assailants.
“Our party wants the APC to know that May 29, 2023 date is sacrosanct for it to leave office, free our nation from its stranglehold and fizzle out from our political firmament.
“Indeed, history will not be kind to APC and its leaders given the magnitude of atrocities they have committed against Nigerians in a space of six years.
“The APC has destroyed our nation, opened our dear fatherland to bandits and terrorists, turned our nation into an expansive killing field and a large funeral palour.
“APC has wrecked our economy, opened our national vaults to its leaders to pillage over N15 trillion and reduced our once thriving country to a beggar nation while mortgaging our future with humongous foreign debts.
“Our party calls on the Inspector General of Police to immediately invite and question APC leaders over the burning of INEC offices.
“Nigerians also expect the police to immediately place APC leaders and their thugs on watch list as a firm step to guarantee the security of INEC facilities and other institutions of democracy in the country.
“The PDP also calls on Nigerians, across board, to remain at alert and unite in prayers so that our nation survives the next two years under the vindictive, insensitive, incompetent, treasury looting, divisive and violent APC and its administration,” the PDP stated.
APC responds
And in a swift response, the governing APC said the opposition PDP was behind the consistent attacks on the INEC facilities.
In a statement signed Tuesday evening in Abuja by the national secretary, APC Caretaker/Extraordinary Convention Planning Committee (CECPC), Senator John James Akpanudoedehe, the party likened PDP’s statement to the Biblical judgement of King Solomon in the case of the two women claiming to be the rightful mother of a child.
The party said: “Using lies and sponsored media attacks on the President Muhammadu Buhari-led APC government, the PDP has inadvertently shown its hands as sponsors behind the politically-motivated attacks on some of our public and democratic institutions in the country, all in a clearly desperate bid to destabilise this government.
“Until now, the APC had deliberately refrained from commenting on the obviously sponsored attacks on INEC facilities in order not to pre-empt the efforts of our security services to unravel the sponsors. The truth is now in the open and our security services should act fast and decisively against these enemies of democracy and haters of a legitimately elected government.
“Perhaps, the PDP thinks Nigerians have forgotten its long and documented penchant of eroding and destroying democratic institutions. To name one, was it not the same PDP that attempted to discredit INEC and the entire 2019 election with a bogus tale of a server that never existed and employed hackers to disrupt the communication network of the electoral body during 2019 election?”
Akpanudoedehe further said the APC cannot be at home and burn its house.
“A winner cannot destroy the process that brought it to success. From the 2015 to 2019 elections, Nigerians spoke clearly through their votes for the APC by mandating us to rescue the country from the PDPs 16-year misadventure. The PDP should address itself to the reality that it stands rejected by the electorates. Its undemocratic plan is ill-fated and will fail woefully.
“In other respected democratic climes, criminalities and governance are differentiated. There is no attempt to politicise, sponsor and weaponise insecurity as the PDP is relentlessly doing. We call on Nigerians to completely reject and resist the PDP antics and actions. They do not mean well for this country,” the ruling party also added.
