2019 POLLS: PDP urges Peace Committee, UN, others to call Buhari to order

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Presidential Campaign Organization (PPCO) has called on the National Peace Committee, the United Nations and all world leaders to save Nigeria from imminent collapse .

It said they should do that by immediately calling President Muhammadu Buhari to order “if we must have peaceful, free, fair and credible general elections in February”.

The Director, Media and Publicity
PDP Presidential Campaign Organization (PPCO), Kola Ologbondiyan, said this at a press briefing on Sunday.

“We want the whole world to know that Nigeria is in a perilous times. President Muhammadu Buhari’s desperation for self-succession has become the major threat to our national unity, stability and peaceful electoral process.

“Having realized that Nigerians are rallying behind our candidate, Atiku Abubakar, as their next President, the Buhari Presidency is now seeking ways to enmesh the electoral process in crisis.

“The Buhari Presidency has been overheating the polity with its unending manipulations of INEC, muzzling of free speech and escalated clampdown on opposition and Civil Society Organizations and we insist that such must stop if we must have a peaceful election.”

It said there will not be free and fair election with Amina Zakari in the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

“PPCO insists that there is no way peace can be guaranteed without a free and fair election. Already, Nigerians across the board are livid with anger over the foisting of Mrs. Amina Zakari, President Buhari’s relation, to head the collation of Presidential election results.

“President Buhari’s insistence on having his relation in charge of collation of Presidential election results is completely provocative, a direct affront to the sensibilities of Nigerians and express invitation to crisis of epic proportion, which is capable of truncating the entire electoral process and derailing our hard-earned democracy.

“The world is aware that majority of Nigerians have rejected Mrs. Amina Zakari. Over 90 percent of the political parties in the election, as well as major political and socio-cultural groups across the country have also called for her resignation from INEC, yet President Buhari is insisting on her stay in the commission.

“Our party is aware of plots by the Buhari Presidency to use Amina Zakari, who has been mentioned as part of those involved in the rigging oft 2018 governorship elections in Ekiti and Osun states, to plunge the 2019 general elections into controversies, truncate the flow of results and even render elections in some critical states inconclusive, to pave way for allocation of fictitious votes to President Buhari and the APC.

“We want the National Peace Committee and the entire world to know that as long as Amina Zakari is in INEC, a peaceful election is not guaranteed because she has the mandate to abuse the process and this will not be accepted by Nigerians.

“The PPCO therefore calls on the National Peace Committee to immediately speak out on the impropriety of having Amina Zakari in INEC as well as insist on her removal so that we can have a credible and peaceful Presidential election.

Apparently referring to the experience of Senator Dino Melaye in the hand of the Nigerian Police, the PDP called on the Chief Justice of Nigeria to note that there was no way there would be peaceful elections with citizens under siege.

“Furthermore the PPCO notes that peaceful election cannot be guaranteed as long as the Buhari Presidency continues to besiege, harass, intimidate, unleash violence and provocative acts of totalitarianism against opposition figures and persons perceived to be against President Buhari’s self-succession bid.

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“The PPCO alerts the entire world and particularly the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) of the ongoing use of the Police to clamp down on opposition figures, particularly members of the PDP Presidential Campaign Council and outspoken CSOs on trumped-up criminal charges.

“Part of the plot is to charge such individuals before certain compromised judicial officers, in various states, who have been briefed to detain, silence and put such opposition figures and CSO members out of circulation until after elections are concluded.

“Particular cases at hand are those of our Presidential Campaign Director on Civil Societies, Senator Dino Melaye, who is being hounded for his outspokenness against the misrule of the Buhari Presidency, as well as Civil Rights activist, Deji Adeyanju, who is widely believed to have been held down in prison because of his scathing criticism against the violations of the rights of Nigerians by the Buhari Presidency.”

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