The All Progressives Congress has asked President Goodluck Jonathan to
\nwalk his talk as far as the organisation of free and fair elections in the
\ncountry is concerned, saying all the assurances so far given by the
\nPresident have not translated into credible elections.<\/p>\n
In a statement in Lagos on Monday by its National Publicity Secretary, Lai
\nMohammed, the party urged the President to go beyond mere rhetoric and
\ntake concrete actions to ensure that the elections in the country are not
\nmarred by the intimidation and harassment of opposition party members and
\nsupporters as well as the deliberate disenfranchisement of voters, which
\nhallmarked the Anambra and Ekiti gubernatorial elections, among others.<\/p>\n
It said, \u201dOn the same day the President\u2019s latest assurances of a free,
\nfair, credible and transparent elections in 2015 were being reported,
\nagents of the Jonathan-led federal government were ransacking the offices
\nof a company hired to carry out an opinion poll for Osun State ahead of
\nthe August 9 gubernatorial election.<\/p>\n
\u201dIf the opposition can no longer freely carry out opinion polls, if the
\ncompanies hired to carry out such polls are harassed and intimidated by
\nSSS officials as they did to tnsrms, the offices of which were searched
\nfor six hours, after which top officials of the firm were dragged to the
\nSSS offices in Shangisha and computers carted away, then how can any
\nPresident convince anyone that free and fair elections can be held under
\nhis watch?<\/p>\n
\u201dIf the Ngozi Okonjo Iweala-linked NOI polling firm has never been
\nharassed for its choreographed opinion polls that favour the Jonathan
\nAdministration, why should other firms be subjected to the kind of
\nGestapo- tactics that tnsrms was exposed to? This is why we are asking
\nPresident Jonathan to walk to talk.\u201d<\/p>\n
The party said that already, the foundation was being laid to rig next
\nmonth\u2019s governorship election in Osun at source, as INEC has been
\nfrustrating attempts by APC members to obtain their Permanent Voters
\nCards, even as the PDP has continued to boast that it will again use the
\nmilitary to illegally shut down the state and bully the opposition in
\nOsun, just like it did in Ekiti.<\/p>\n
It also wondered whether INEC Chairman Attahiru Jega properly weighed the
\nstatement he made, in which he tried to justify the deployment of troops
\nto Ekiti for the state\u2019s gubernatorial election on the basis that they
\nhelped to ensure a violence-free election<\/p>\n
It said, \u201dJega should be asked to explain why is it that the troops who
\nwere sent to provide security for the Ekiti election were harassing and
\nintimidating only the opposition? Why is it that they were arresting only
\nopposition members? Is that also part of providing security for an
\nelection? If soldiers had only provided non-intrusive security for the
\nelection, perhaps no one would have complained. But where they turned
\nthemselves into the enforcement arm of the ruling party, everyone,
\nincluding INEC, should be concerned.\u201d<\/p>\n
The party called on President Jonathan to refrain from deploying the
\nmilitary for election purposes and read the riot act to his cabinet
\nmembers, like Musiliu Obanikoro and Abduljelili Adesiyna, and party
\nofficials who specialise in electoral malfeasance, and elections will
\nstart becoming free, fair, credible and transparent to such an extent that
\nthe world will notice.<\/p>\n
\u201dSaying one thing and doing the opposite, Mr. President, will not
\ntranslate to credible elections. The world is watching,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n
As a starting point, APC urged the President, if indeed he is committed to
\nfree and fair elections, to launch an inquiry into why the offices of the
\nfirm carrying out an opinion poll for Osun State were invaded, and to tell
\nNigerians whether the firm would have been harassed if it had been hired
\nby the PDP or its candidate for the August 9 election.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The All Progressives Congress has asked President Goodluck Jonathan to walk his talk as far as the organisation of free and fair elections in the country is concerned, saying all…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23314,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29566","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-exclusive"],"yoast_head":"\n