PDP: APC plans to frustrate accreditation with card readers

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has accused the All progressives Congress (APC) of working in cahoots with some strategically placed and retrogressive elements to use the card readers to frustrate accreditation in some parts of the country while not enforcing strict use of the machines in some other parts.

The party also denied APC’s allegation that it was plotting to implicate Attahiru Jega, chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), to pave the way for his removal; and arrest leading opposition officials while hacking into the database of the commission.

“This morning, through its national publicity secretary, Lai Mohammed, the APC has made a series of absurd and clearly ludicrous claims and allegations. It is clear that these claims and allegations are nothing but the paranoid ranting of a paranoid little man that is working for a paranoid party. Rather than trying to prepare his masters’ minds for the defeat that is coming their way, Lai Mohammed has come again with his verbal diarrhea,” Femi Fani-Kayode, director of media and publicity of the PDP presidential campaign, said.

“The truth is that we are not strategising to shift the election dates. We are not trying to frame up Jega. We have no plans to plant any illegal substance in the bags of any of the leaders of the APC whenever they travel. We are not trying to compromise the telephone numbers of any of the INEC officials. President Jonathan is not planning to arrest opposition leaders before the elections.

“The presidency has not retained the services of any foreigner to corrupt or compromise INEC computers on election day and we are not planning to do any of the other reprehensible things that they have alleged. The truth is that if they were in our position, these are the sort of sordid things that they would do. Such dirty things and filthy tactics are a way of life and an art with them. But for us, such things are alien, perverse and unacceptable.

“The PDP Presidential Campaign Organisation is not surprised that the APC is resorting to peddling falsehood in order to gain public sympathy. For quite some time now, the party has been displaying its expertise in the cheap propaganda for which it is well-known. We take exception to their fiction and false claims and we will not take this matter lightly.”

Fani-Kayode described APC’s spurious allegations as part of a well-documented pattern of lies that only recently saw them falsely claim that an interview conducted by one of its sympathisers at the Abuja Transcorp Hilton Hotel was conducted by a so-called independent journalist in the UK.

“The whole world now knows that, on that occasion, as on many other occasions, the APC told a barefaced lie,” he said.

“This new smear campaign against the PDP-led federal government is clearly propelled by the fact that the APC knows fully that it has gone as far as it can go with its propaganda and deceit and that it will be thoroughly beaten by the PDP at the polls in the upcoming elections.

“The APC and its leaders are simply unraveling and falling apart at the seams. They are the ones who had perfected a plan to rig the forthcoming elections through the lopsided distribution of Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs). They were very comfortable with the fact that 34 percent of registered voters had not collected their PVCs as at February 14 just before the presidential election was postponed.

“The APC and its leaders said that they were ready for that election when it was obvious that the PVC collection rate in the north, comprising some of the traditional strongholds of their presidential candidate, General Muhammadu Buhari, was higher than the collection rate in the south, the traditional support base of our candidate, President Goodluck Jonathan.

“We are happy that many eligible voters are now going out to collect their PVCs. We know that the APC and its leaders are not happy about this development because they had wanted to railroad themselves on the nation through a compromised and rigged election. How can they be happy when the advantage they obviously enjoyed before the postponement of the February 14 presidential election has now been removed?

“Our position on the card reader remains that the machine has not been tested in any election and there are bases for genuine concern over the use of the machine, for the first time, in a crucial election of this magnitude. We are aware of the plot by the APC, working in cahoots with some strategically placed and retrogressive elements, to use the card readers to frustrate accreditation in some parts of the country while not enforcing strict use of the machines in some other parts. The truth is that if they go ahead with that wicked plot, the APC and its collaborators will only be preparing the ground for mass resistance. They can be rest assured that we will not sit by idly and allow such a thing to unfold.

“The APC and its leaders are merchants of violence. They are creating laughable scenarios and possibilities that will feed into their agenda to cause chaos and violence before, during and after the forthcoming elections. This is why we insist on the deployment of soldiers in the forthcoming elections as it was done in the gubernatorial elections in Edo and Osun where APC won, in Ondo where Labour Party won, in Anambra where APGA won, and in Ekiti where the PDP won.

“One of the APC governors in the person of Adams Oshiomhole had this to say during the 2012 governorship election in Edo State and I quote: ‘The army is here to deal with trouble-makers. The only people who need to be worried are those who intend to cause trouble… As the Governor of Edo State, I believe we need the army to complement the efforts of the Police. I remember that under our Operation Thunder Storm, the army has since been involved in complementing the efforts of the Police to provide internal security. So don’t allow anybody to fool you that army is going to harass you, to prevent you from voting. No! The army is here to assist so that your vote will count’.

“So why is the APC now paranoid about the deployment of soldiers? They are certainly up to something sinister.
The PDP has always insisted that the INEC has the constitutional duty to conduct free and fair elections and hence has never interfered with the Commission’s preparations. Specifically, President Goodluck Jonathan has always said he and his government have absolutely no intention of interfering with INEC’s activities, even though the INEC chairman and commissioners are his appointees.
We can categorically state that the PDP, having earned pass marks for overseeing the conduct of free and fair elections in the past had no plans to compromise the coming elections, given our high-level of preparedness for the exercise.

“As at today, President Goodluck Jonathan has led the campaign of PDP to all the 36 states of the Federation, specifically to most places which the APC and other parties had never gone to. We are, by this, confident of winning the forthcoming elections by the grace of the Almighty God and the support of a vast majority of Nigerians. We will win resoundingly while the APC will suffer a crushing and irreversible defeat.”