De-Registration: PDP Replies Lai Mohammed

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) says there is a ploy by the All Progressives Congress (APC) led Federal Government to strangulate all opposition parties and create a “self-succession plan” for President Muhammadu Buhari.

The PDP in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, on Sunday was reacting to a call by the Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, for the main opposition party to be de-registered as a political party.

Speaking on the release of the abducted Dapchi School Girls in Lagos on Sunday, Mr Mohammed said the politicization of the kidnap of the Dapchi girls and their subsequent release was bad enough.

“You are not unaware of the reaction of the naysayers – the main opposition PDP in particular – to the release of the Dapchi girls. What called for non-partisan celebrations was rather thoughtlessly turned into politics, bad, despicable politics that has no place in any democracy. At times of national tragedies, countries unite. This is the norm everywhere.

“There should be a new criterion for withdrawing the registration of a party like the PDP which has failed both as a ruling and an opposition party! If a party cannot rule and cannot be in opposition, what else can it do?,” the minister said.

But reacting same Sunday, Ologbondiyan, said Nigerians should be alerted of the APC’s plan to enable President Buhari run as a sole candidate in 2019.

The statement read: “Our attention has been drawn to a press statement by the Minister of Information, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, wherein he demanded that the certificate of registration issued to the PDP by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) should be withdrawn because the PDP lost in an election and according to him, does not know how to function as an opposition party.

“We want to alert all Nigerians of a clandestine plot by the All Progressives Congress (APC) led Federal Government to strangulate the main opposition party and plot the way for the self-succession plan of their candidate, President Muhammadu Buhari.

“Our party has been following all the schemes and shenanigans of the APC as 2019 general elections draw nearer.

“The main plank of the plot is to ensure that President Buhari runs as a sole candidate in 2019. To achieve this grand plan, they must work to exterminate all known and perceived political opposition platforms in our country.

“Is it not strange that a party who, in its almost five years of existence, cannot constitute a Board of Trustees (BoT) in line with the provisions of its own constitution will be asking INEC to withdraw the certificate of a party whose all organs are intact and effectively functioning?

“Is it not also laughable that a party, who cannot hold even a non-elective convention, will be calling for the withdrawal of PDP’s certificate?

“It is imperative to tell Alhaji Lai Mohammed and his cohorts in the APC that any masquerade that dances first will eventually have to watch the dance steps of others from the stand.

“It is clear now that the APC and its Federal Government have come to their wit’s end. All they need to do now is to sit by and watch Nigerians collectively return the PDP to powers and by so doing restore the nation to the path of unity, national cohesion and economic prosperity come 2019.”