APC: Obasanjo’s Call For Election Cancellation Is A Coup

The All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council (APC PCC) has described the call by former President Olusegun Obasanjo to cancel last Saturday’s elections in areas where the exercise was disrupted as a coup against democracy and the country’s constitution. 

APC in a statement by its Special Adviser, Media, Communications and Public Affairs (APC PCC), Dele Alake, said it is tragic that Obasanjo who ought to be a statesman in comportment and speech will recklessly seek to endanger and derail Nigeria’s democratic process for utterly selfish, egoistic and malicious reasons.

Recall that the former president in a letter to President Muhammadu Buhari on Monday alleged that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had compromised the conduct of the elections after millions of naira were received for organizing the election. 

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Obasanjo, who had declared his support for the presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi, tasked Buhari not to allow anybody to truncate his legacy of a free and fair election. 

APC PCC stated that Obasanjo could not substantiate his claims and called for the cancellation of already conducted elections based on frivolous, unfounded, and baseless allegations that portrayed him as a sore loser and has no respect for democratic values.

Tinubu’s campaign team further noted that it was aware that Obasanjo was not an impartial and disinterested party in this election, having issued a characteristically lengthy epistle to Nigerians endorsing the candidacy of Peter Obi and asking Nigerian youths to vote en masse for him.

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The APC PCC maintained that no true democrat will seek an abortion of the process just because he believed the elections were not going his way.

The team, however, urged Nigerians and concerned stakeholders to condemn and ignore Obasanjo’s remarks and ignored, saying the amended constitution had stipulated processes for seeking redress against electoral malpractices which had been tested several times and used to redress electoral injustice where such had been proven.

The statement reads, “Our attention has been drawn to a press statement by former President Olusegun Obasanjo in which he was virtually calling for a truncation of the ongoing electoral process and a cancellation of already conducted elections on the basis of frivolous, unfounded and baseless allegations by politicians who are sore losers and have no respect for democratic values.

“Obasanjo repeated without the slightest iota of evidence rumours he had picked up that the Bimodal Voters Accreditation System had been compromised and that the results of elections being announced are fraudulent. It is tragic that a former President who ought to be a statesman in comportment and speech will recklessly seek to endanger and derail our democratic process for utterly selfish, egoistic and malicious reasons. He offers not a single credible piece of evidence to prove his laughable and ridiculous allegations against INEC and the credibility of the ongoing process.”

“Of course our reaction was that the former President was entitled to his view and that the outcome of the elections would demonstrate if he had any electoral value. As fate would have it, Peter Obi was defeated even in Obasanjo’s own polling unit in Abeokuta in Ogun State. But it is now obvious that the only election Obasanjo will agree to being free, fair and credible is one that produces Obi as winner which is ridiculous.

“Is Obasanjo also querying the outcome of the presidential elections in Lagos or Delta where Obi won? If the outcome in Lagos won by Obi is free and credible, on what basis is he querying the outcome of the elections in other places? This is pure mischief and sheer hypocrisy. Obasanjo wants President Muhammadu Buhari to intervene in an undemocratic manner to truncate the ongoing political process just the way he did most shamelessness in the 2003 and 2007 elections widely described as the worst in our political history.

“Nigerians must reject Obasanjo’s dubious and hypocritical advice and stay strictly and firmly on the path of constitutionalism and democratic due process.”