PDP Tackles Presidency On Response To Buhari’s ‘Third Term Bid’

 
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), on Wednesday, tackled the presidency over its response to reports that President Muhammadu Buhari was allegedly nursing a plan to remain in office more than the constitutionally allowed two terms in office.

“There are no circumstances – nor a set of circumstances – under which President Buhari may seek to amend the Constitution regarding the two-term term limit on holding office as President,” Buhari’s media aide, Garba Shehu, had said in statement on Monday to dismiss the reports.

Shehu had taken at swipe at former president Olusegun Obasanjo, who ruled the country between 1999 to 2007 under the platform of the PDP, saying Buhari would not attempt to amend the constitution to achieve third term in office as allegedly attempted by the former president.

“It is important to note that there was a past attempt to change the constitution to allow for the then incumbent president to stand for a third term. That attempt was wrong, unconstitutional – and rightly rebuffed,” said Shehu.

The presidency also distanced President Buhari from some groups who allegedly stage street demonstrations to urge the president to seek third term in office.

“The Presidency wishes to correct internet-based gossip and un-informed media commentary regarding presidential term limits, given credence by so-called support groups, staging street demonstrations asking President Muhammadu Buhari to do a third term,” Shehu added.

But responding in statement by its national spokesman, Kola Ologbondiyan, the PDP insisted that Buhari was nursing a third term agenda.

The opposition party cautioned the presidency and the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) against the alleged plot.

The PDP said the bid is “a dangerous underhand politics capable of derailing our democracy and destabilizing our nation.”

It described the presidency’s response to the reports as “unhealthy ploy to introduce a repugnant issue into official discourse in a bid to give it a life and achieve its fruition in the political arena.

“…it is preposterous for the Presidency cabal and the APC to think that Nigerians cannot see through their shenanigan to import and elevate what they labeled as rumor and internet-based gossip, into official national discourse.

“Our party notes that Nigerians will not be surprised when, after the statements by the Presidency and APC, new groups surface to orchestrate more forceful agitations in the public space for the alteration of the 1999 Constitution to achieve an ignoble aim,” said the party.

The PDP also accused the APC of sponsoring those that staged street demonstrations to call on Buhari to seek third term re-election.

“Nigerians are already aware of individuals and political interests in the Presidency cabal in addition to known APC agents who are behind the street demonstrations for a third term for President Buhari.

“The party invites Nigerians to note how, having been busted, the presidency cabal and the APC are now groping for ways to cover their trails by making frivolous allegations which directly point back to them,” it said.

The opposition party further called on Buhari to, “personally speak out and immediately call his supporters to order as Nigerians will never allow anybody, no matter how highly placed, to alter any part of our constitution to serve a selfish interest,” adding that, “this has become imperative in view of the series of constitutional violations and provocative undermining of our laws by the APC and power mongers in the  Buhari Presidency.”