State House, Abuja – The Presidency has tackled Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, for accusing President Bola Ahmed Tinubu of trying to impose a one-party state.
Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, said the PDP and Atiku are making “wild and libellous allegations” against President Tinubu because of the Court of Appeal judgement that sacked some PDP governors.
Presidency replies Atiku, says Tinubu not eyeing one-party state
Photo Credit: Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu/Atiku AbubakarSource: Facebook
In a statement shared via his X page (formerly known as Twitter), @aonanuga1956, Onanuga said the allegation that Tinubu is planning to impose a one-party state is aimed at heating the polity and that they exist only in the imagination of the PDP and Atiku.
“While we do not hold brief for the judiciary, we urge Nigerians to discountenance the malicious allegations by the PDP and its candidate that President Tinubu as governor of Lagos, silenced the opposition and corrupted the judiciary and that he is planning to foist a one-party state on the country by appointing “loyalists” as Resident Electoral Commissioners (RECs).”
He added:
“President Tinubu is also not planning to impose a one-party state as Atiku has serially alleged and his party and spokesman have now parroted.
“These allegations are deliberately aimed at unnecessarily heating up the polity and causing disenchantment in our country.”
He urged Atiku and the PDP to stop their campaign of calumny and blackmail against the judiciary over the Appeal Court rulings on governorship elections in Plateau and Zamfara states.
Onanuga added that President Tinubu is a democrat unlike Atiku who confessed that PDP hijacked the south-west in 2003.
“In contrast, it is on record that Atiku Abubakar recently confessed about the electoral heist his party executed in the South West in 2003, in, which Tinubu survived out of the six Governors of the defunct Alliance for Democracy.”
Atiku kicks as court of appeal sacks 2 PDP governors
Earlier, AmbaJay reported that Atiku accused the All Progressives Congress (APC) of snatching the mandates of the opposition parties in the country.
The former vice president accused the ruling party of killing the opposition party in the country, adding that the beauty of democracy is the existence of “plurality”.
Atiku alleged that the APC has narrowed the scope of engagement of the opposition either through rigging or the court.
