Posted by From NWAGBO NNENYELIKE, Ilorin on
The Action Congress (AC) has called on President Umaru Yar'Adua to act swiftly to rectify the situation that has led to the election petition tribunals and the Supreme Court nullifying one election after another or reversing illegal decisions.
The Action Congress (AC) has called on President Umaru Yar'Adua to act swiftly to rectify the situation that has led to the election petition tribunals and the Supreme Court nullifying one election after another or reversing illegal decisions.
In a statement issued in Abuja on Sunday by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said the starting point would be the reconstitution of INEC and the sanitization of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), and other law enforcement agencies, ahead of the by/fresh elections ordered by the tribunals and the local government polls in the country.
AC said it would amount to a disaster, an avoidable one at that, to have the old order in place to conduct the by/fresh elections that will result from the outcome of the various election tribunals sitting across the country as well as the council polls.
It specifically called for the trial of all those who have put Nigeria in the avoidable, shameful situation of having the election of governors as well as lawmakers at state and federal levels nullified in droves, a development it said was unprecedented in the country's history.
AC listed some of such persons as members of INEC, led by its Chairman, Maurice Iwu; EFCC Chairman, Nuhu Ribadu, as well as the security agencies, all of whom colluded with former president Olusegun Obasanjo to make a mess of what had been billed as historic polls.
'Together, these people played a major role in the monumental disgrace the April elections turned out to be and the process leading to the polls, especially the failure of the Peoples Democratic Party, which seems only democratic in name, to respect its own rules, leading to the shuffling of candidates like a pack of cards and at the whims and caprices of Obasanjo,
'We also recollect that the EFCC orchestrated the so-called indictment of Rotimi Amaechi, which led to his illegal substitution as the PDP's gubernatorial candidate with Celestine Omehia, who never contested the party's primaries. Thankfully, the injustice done to Amaechi has been redressed by the Supreme Court.
'It is pertinent also to remind Nigerians that the same EFCC said Abubakar Audu of Kogi was not qualified to contest for the Kogi State gubernatorial election on the basis of a phantom indictment, even after he has been duly nominated by his party, ANPP.
'Of course the nonsense in Kebbi, where a non-party man was put forward by the PDP as its gubernatorial candidate, has also come to the fore with the decision of the state's electoral tribunal nullifying the governorship election there.
'While the EFCC was weaving its web of lies against selected candidates, in the name of fighting corruption, the INEC turned itself to an arm of the PDP and a willing tool in the hands of a vindictive president, who also used the security agencies, to thwart the will of the people at the polls.
'Unless the disgusting ‘legacy' of witch-hunting, brigandage, lawlessness and unconstitutional acts left by Obasanjo is dismantled, all the talk about the supremacy of the rule of law and due process will amount to a mere sloganeering," AC warned.