The Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has rejected a claim by Senator Ibrahim Mantu, a former deputy senate president, that he previously rigged elections for the party. Kola Ologbondiayan, the spokesperson for the opposition party, rejected the allegation in a statement he issued on Sunday. “Senator Mantu’s reported claims was personal to him and has nothing to do with the PDP”, said Ologbondiyan in the statement.
“The PDP has never directed or had any pact with him to rig election on its behalf. Never!”, he added.
The party in further exoneration said it issues electoral candidates on its platform with the party’s Code of Conduct and that the ‘rules of engagement does not tell candidates or party members to rig elections on behalf of the party’.
It further said: “If any member’s conduct transgressed these basic rules of engagement, that individual did not act on behalf of the PDP, and as such the party cannot be vicariously held responsible.”
Moreover, the PDP in a separate statement said the ruling All Progressives Congress was only chasing shadows with its probe of alleged data hacking by British company, Cambridge Analytica. A report in the Guardian.UK claimed Cambridge Analytica, while working for the re-election of former President Goodluck Jonathan, used financial and media records of then presidential candidate Muhammadu Buhari during 2015 electioneering.
The PDP said the probe is a “desperate plot to implicate the opposition”. The party though welcomed the probe, it also “demands that such inquest be extended to cover the sources of the looted funds used to prosecute President Buhari’s campaign in 2015”.
The PDP said: “We are therefore aware that this new agenda is to divert public attention from the various scandalous allegations hanging on the neck of the Buhari Presidency, including the use of looted funds to finance his 2015 Presidential election, the Martin Luther Kings award saga, the damaging Bill Gates verdict on the Buhari’s economic policies as well as the numerous financial scandals in the NNPC under his watch.
“This inquest should therefore be completely open and independent of government control, so that Nigerians will know the truth, not only on the Cambridge Analytica saga, but also on the source of funds for the President’s 2015 campaign and other sleazes under his watch.”
Fola Ademosu
Discussion about this post