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PDP says blocking venue of Atiku’s rally is a sign of weakness

By Azimazi Momoh Jimoh, Abuja
10 February 2019   |   4:14 am
The Peoples DemocraticParty (PDP), yesterday accused the Presidency and the All Progressives Congress (APC) of denying it the use of the Old Parade Ground, Garki, Abuja, where its presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, was supposed to hold his mega rally.

[FILE PHOTO] PDP chief, Uche Secondus<br />Photo: Twitter/UcheSecondus

The Peoples DemocraticParty (PDP), yesterday accused the Presidency and the All Progressives Congress (APC) of denying it the use of the Old Parade Ground, Garki, Abuja, where its presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, was supposed to hold his mega rally.

According to the party, this vexed development after all payments were duly made, was a direct attempt by the Muhammadu Buhari-led Presidency to foment serious crisis.

Addressing journalists in Abuja, yesterday, the PDP, through its national publicity secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, said: “For us in the PDP Presidential Campaign Organisation, this is part of the last kicks of a dying horse, which the Buhari Presidency now represents.”

According to the opposition party, “it is part of the plot by the frustrated President Muhammadu Buhari and the APC to drag the PDP and the people’s candidate to their low level of frustration in order to enmesh the coming election in a crisis so as to achieve their self-succession bid.

“We invite the world to note that this latest assault against the people’s candidate is also borne out of direct ill-will and hatred against him by President Muhammadu Buhari, as well as his handlers, who have sought all ways to drag him down, since they realised that Nigerians have reached a consensus on Atiku Abubakar, as the next President of our country,” the PDP stated.

The party, however, said that: “Atiku Abubakar, being a true democrat and statesman has decided to go with the people in their collective quest to rescue our nation from the vengeful, divisive, violent prone, insensitive, completely incompetent and inherently corrupt Buhari administration.”

It therefore cautioned President Buhari and the APC to note that, “with the level of consensus Atiku Abubakar enjoys throughout our country and even across the world, any assault on him is a direct assault on the overall aspiration and sensibilities of Nigerians as a whole.”

The PDP also pointed out that, “the more the Buhari Presidency attacks the people’s candidate, the more his support base among Nigerians expands.”

The PDP threatened that, “any further attack on our campaign will therefore attract very dire response from Nigerians who look up to Atiku Abubakar to salvage our dear nation from the social, economic and political despondency, which President Buhari has plunged her into.”

The party continued: “From reports reaching us, it is not also out of place for the Buhari Presidency and the APC to use this measure to test the will of Nigerians as precursor to their rigging plots. We want to place on record, once again that any attempt to rig the February 16 election will be vehemently resisted by Nigerians, across board, who have reached a consensus to rescue their nation from the stranglehold of the Buhari Presidency.

“In any case, let it be known to President Buhari and the APC that the PDP and the people’s candidate will definitely hold our presidential mega rally in Abuja irrespective of any further encumbrance they may attempt to foist. Nigeria belongs to all of us and nobody can stop us from exercising our constitutionally guaranteed right of holding our rally in the FCT or any other part of our country for that matter.”

The PDP also described as ridiculous the mounting of the broom statue around key National monument in Abuja, pointing out that it is a sign that the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari has come to its wits end.

“We have had democracy since 1999 till date. That is 20 years. In PDP’s 16 years, we did everything possible to create that City Gate. We don’t think that anybody ever thought of it to go and put PDP symbol as a monument or as a statue at the City Gate.

“We just believe that this administration has come to its wits end, and they are doing everything possible to impose themselves into the consciousness of the people. But that will not stand.”

The opposition party lamented that the broom statue was mounted with huge amount of money in a part of the Federal Capital Territory where poverty had become become unbearable to the People.

“You can imagine that in an environment like the City Gate surrounded by IDPs, a government will go and spend millions of naira to erect a broom statue. It might interest you to even know that that is the first project in the life of this administration that they have conceptualised, from the beginning and completed.

So, all that President Buhari can deliver apart from posters and billboards around the city of Abuja is the statue of a broom. This is laughable.

Unfortunately, it is a sympathetic metaphor on the life of our nation that we can get this low as a people. And the painful aspect of it is that by the time the people’s candidate is elected and he assumes office on May 29, we will have to pay money again to dismantle that famished structure that they put there,” it added.

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