APC planning character assassination of our leaders -PDP

The Peoples Democratic Party Presidential Campaign Organisation on Friday alleged that the opposition All ProgressivesCongress is planning to attack and assassinate the characters of its leaders ahead of the March 28 and April 11 general elections

The Director of Media and Publicity of the campaign organisation, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode, made the allegation while addressing journalists in Abuja.

He said his party was in possession of credible information about the alleged APC’s plan to procure the services of some disgruntled persons within and outside the country to carry out the attacks.

Fani-Kayode further alleged that, “They have offered huge sums of money to the former staff of numerous PDP leaders, including the President, the Vice President, the National Chairman, the DG of the Presidential Campaign Organisation, the Chairman of the PDP Board of Trustees, the National Security Adviser, two Directors of the Presidential Campaign Organisation including my good self and numerous other key government and party leaders and functionaries to fabricate the most unbelievable, salacious, chilling and macabre tales about their former principals in an attempt to discredit us.”

While condemning planned “Lagosians March for Change” being organised by Buhari/Osinbajo Campaign Organisation today in Lagos, Fani-Kayode argued that if there should be any rally or protest in Lagos, such should be directed against some national leaders of the party.”

Meanwhile, a group operating under the auspices of the PDP Integrity Vanguard, has expressed fears that the database of the Independent National Electoral Commission would have been compromised by some unscrupulous persons, and therefore raised anxiety over the outcome of the results of the general elections.

Addressing journalists in Abuja, the Leader of the Group, Senator Aniete Okon, said recent discoveries by the PDP Integrity Vanguard appear to provide sufficient proof that the allegations of cloning of INEC database could have been true after all.

Okon, who called for immediate forensic examination of the INEC database, revealed how the Permanent Voter Card, of a woman, Mrs. Effiong, who registered in Gwarimpa, in FCT, was cloned in Akwa Ibom State.

He expressed doubt about the electoral umpire’s readiness to conduct a transparent election following the myriad of defects and failings apparent in the processes.

Okon said, “The entire gamut of INEC’s logistics and the technologies it has deployed so far has generated public anxiety in recent times.

“This is not without reason. Nigerians have been apprehensive over the myriad of defects and failings apparent in INEC’s processes, which underscores INEC’s persisting unpreparedness quite contrary to earlier claims by INEC that it was ready as of February 14, 2015 to conduct elections.

“INEC truly might have been ‘ready’ as a matter of fact. The question however is, what manner and quality of elections would INEC have delivered given that it has become clear that at that level of readiness, nearly 50 per cent of legitimate voters would have been disenfranchised for no fault of theirs?

“More worrisome are the various discoveries that our group has made in the last week. Those discoveries appear to reinforce our earlier position in which we established a nexus between these apparent imperfections and the clamour by APC for elections to go on however unprepared INEC was at the time.

“We must recall that the APC, like a rabid attack dog, had jumped to its feet to denigrate the DSS following shocking revelations made by the later with reference to a certain office in Lagos which turned out to be APC’s secret data center. For the purpose of this press conference, it is important to recap the sequence of events in relation to that saga.

“The first point of significance is that the premises was designed to be a secret office, which explains why there were no signs or publicity of any kind as you would expect to see in facilities belonging to a political party.

“Political parties by their very nature would usually seize every available opportunity and space to assert and announce their presence. We consider it very curious that APC concealed itself away in a state under its governance.”

When contacted, the National Publicity Secretary of the APC, Alhaji Lai Mohammed said, “No comment.”

He was asked to comment on allegations by the PDP campaign that the APC was planning to procure the services of former aides of PDP leaders to cast aspersions on their former bosses.