APC, PDP in hot words over foul language

The All Progressives Congress, APC, and Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, were, yesterday, locked in a face-off over responsibility for the introduction of foul language in the political space just as the dominant opposition party affirmed that the country’s political landscape has been redesigned to the disadvantage of the PDP.

The Director-General of the Buhari Campaign Organisation, Governor Rotimi Amaechi in a press conference in Lagos yesterday, said the APC would monitor every polling booth in the country with agents in such a way that election results would only be twisted through the use of military force.
Earlier yesterday, the APC had flayed the PDP for resorting to foul language in its campaign, saying that in the absence of issues to hang on, the ruling party resorted to mudslinging.

The party in a statement issued by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed noted that spokespersons of President Goodluck Jonathan and the PDP had been particularly overactive since the APC convention ended on a crisis-free note.

APC tackles PDP
The statement was in apparent reaction to insinuations by PDP officials on Monday that APC presidential candidate, Muhammdu Buhari is a semi-illiterate.

“What is issues-based in calling Gen. Buhari a ‘semi-literate jackboot’ as the PDP’s National Secretary Wale Oladipo has incautiously said? Where are the issues in the pejorative reference to Prof. Osinbajo as an ‘acolyte’ of Tinubu, or in describing Tinubu himself as a puppeteer, as the PDP’s National Publicity Secretary Olisa Metuh has said in the most vitriolic and irresponsible statement that can ever be issued by the spokesman of a ruling party anywhere?

“Where are the issues contained in the statement by the serial bumbler and gormandizer called Doyin Okupe, who regards Gen. Buhari’s refusal to enrich himself from the public till as a vice rather than a virtue? Why would a ruling party go after the jugular of the opposition simply because it took its time in choosing its presidential running mate, especially since it did not run foul of any electoral law in doing so?

“The truth is that the Jonathan Presidency and the PDP have no issues to canvass during the electioneering campaign for the 2015 general elections because they have wasted the mandate given to them by Nigerians on the altar of unprecedented corruption, incomprehensible incompetence and cluelessness and perhaps the worst leadership ever inflicted on our country,’’ APC said.

PDP hits back at APC
Responding to the assertion, yesterday, the PDP through its National Publicity Secretary, Chief Olisa Metuh accused the APC of being the one that fouled the polity with its negative ascriptions of its officials and particularly the president.

Insisting that the PDP would maintain the moral high ground, Metuh said:  “In the PDP, we occupy the moral high ground as far as our commitment to issues-based campaign is concerned.  Our word remains our bond.  Since we made that commitment, we have focused on issues.

“We have also taken up the responsibility of drawing the attention of Nigerians to the obvious cases of incompetence and failings of the APC and those who aspire to the leadership of our nation through that platform.

“There has never been any instance that we have maliciously attacked the characters of those on the presidential ticket of the APC; rather, we have been alive to our responsibility of offering public service so that Nigerians will not be deceived.

“The particular statement by Professor Oladipo, referred to by the APC, which we even consider as complimentary, does not in any way compare with the many instances of vicious, malicious and provocative attacks on the person and office of our presidential candidate, Dr Goodluck Jonathan, after we made the commitment to engage in a decent campaign.

“It is on record that a few days after the commitment alluded to by the APC, Kano State Governor, Rabiu Kwankwaso, attacked the person of President Jonathan, describing him as an ‘incompetent commander-in-chief.’  No personal attack could be more vicious and unconscionable.

“Similarly, the Rivers State Governor, Rotimi Amaechi, has consistently prosecuted a hate campaign against President Jonathan, describing him as ‘an enemy of Rivers people.’ I ask the APC and my friend, Lai Mohammed, if this destructive campaign sounds like a love song to him?

“Also, the National Chairman of the APC, Chief John Oyegun, at the church event to mark the 60th birthday of APC Deputy National Chairman (South), Chief Segun Oni, in Ifaki-Ekiti, attacked the person of President Jonathan describing him as ‘a misfit’ for the presidency of the nation.

“Even my friend Lai Mohammed is not blameless.  For him to declare to the world that President Jonathan was responsible for the killings of Nigerians by Boko Haram insurgents, when he knows those whose utterances and clandestine activities fuel the insurgency, smacks of political mischief.

“To worsen the entire matter, the APC presidential candidate himself, General Muhammadu Buhari, is complicit in the propagation of personal attack over and above issues. It was insulting for Buhari to say, as he did in Sokoto last Sunday, that ‘no right-thinking Nigerian will vote for Jonathan.’ Is this the APC’s understanding of an issues-based campaign.

“It is important to point out that President Jonathan has never, ever, whether before or after he became the candidate of our party, attacked the character or person of General Buhari.  In his declaration speech and acceptance speech after he was nominated as presidential candidate of our party, there was nowhere in the speeches or speeches made on subsequent occasions in which he attacked the person of Buhari.”

Nigeria’s electoral map has been redesigned — Amaechi
The assertions nonetheless, the APC presidential campaign pushed forward, yesterday, as Buhari’s campaign manager, Governor Amaehci insisted that the prospects of his candidate were very bright on the grounds that the country’s electoral map had  been redesigned.

At his inaugural press conference in Lagos, yesterday, Amaechi said the APC would provide agents in every polling booth to frustrate any plans to alter polling results.

According to him, “part of the problem of opposition parties in the past was that they didn’t have resources to employ agents. Agents are essential for monitoring of elections. So, once your agent is there and refuses that they won’t write results, they won’t be able to write results unless they use military to fight everybody. We will ensure that there are  people who are representing APC in all polling booths.”

Noting how the APC had become a frightening spectre for the PDP, he continued: “Before, you had three or four weak parties that used to confront the PDP. Now the PDP knows that it has a strong opposition, they know. Now, Nigerians want change and they will protect their results. We must be prepared to make sacrifices before we can have change. We don’t have to fight the PDP because we think that Nigerians will give us the money and we believe that Nigerians are the best people that can protect their votes by themselves.

Dismissing assumptions that the APC presidential candidate will not win next year’s election, he said “there is a wrong assumption that Buhari won’t win but I believe that Buhari will win and it is simple electoral mathematics.”

He said “Buhari will win 2015 presidential election by God’s grace and he will also win because the  political map did not favour the president any more. In 2011, the South-South and South-East, we said he (Jonathan) is our brother and now we are saying he is not our brother.

“Before, the president had 100 per cent of the South-South and South-East but now, there is problem for the PDP in Cross River, there is problem for the PDP in Bayelsa, there is problem for the PDP in Rivers and in Delta. It wasn’t like that before. By this time, the PDP would have been dancing, but have you seen them dancing?”