Posted by By JAMES OJO, Abuja on
All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) on Thursday vowed to challenge the results of the April 21, presidential, which the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared was won by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Alhaji Umar Yar'Adua.
All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) on Thursday vowed to challenge the results of the April 21, presidential, which the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared was won by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Alhaji Umar Yar'Adua.
The ANPP chairman and vice presidential candidate, Chief Edwin Ume-Ezeoke, said the party was already gathering facts and evidence to contest the victory awarded to Yar'Adua at the tribunal.
The ANPP position, announced at a briefing at the party's headquarters in Abuja, ran counter to the stance of its presidential candidate, General Muhammadu Buhari, not to go to court over the poll's outcome. Buhari was awarded 6, 605, 279, to come a distant second position to Yar'Adua' s 24,638,063.
The development also came amid a plea by the coalition of opposition parties seeking cancellation of the general elections to their members and Nigerians to pray for the deliverance of the country "from those who stole the people's mandate." The opposition parties made the plea in a press statement issued on the platform of a group named Nigerians United for Democracy (NUD) and signed by their spokesman, Alhaji Lai Mohammed.
At the ANPP briefing, the ANPP vice presidential candidate, Ume-Ezeoke stressed that the party would employ every legitimate means to win back the mandate the people gave it at the polls.
According to him, the party was ready to fight for the cancellation of the April 21 elections because local monitors, international observers and the media saw that what happened was not elections.
"There was a display of aristocratic democracy where a few cabal hijacked the inalienable right of the Nigerian citizen by deciding on their behalf, who should represent them at every level of government. The PDP, in close collaboration with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the security forces, decided to manufacture results and announced these results in total disregard to the objective choice and electoral expressions of the people," he alleged.
Chief Ume-Ezeoke, who wore a sober look throughout the press briefing, described the event of April 14 and 21, 2007 as the worst psychological torture that any government has ever exposed Nigerians to in the name of elections since the birth of the nation.
"We shall pursue our call for the cancellation of the elections through the election tribunals and will not stop until we have explored all judicial and constitutional avenues to ensure that the rights of the Nigerian citizens is respected and protected," he vowed.
The ANPP chairman told party members who have put in for elections in area where polls are to be repeated tomorrow by INEC to come and vote, even though the party has lost confidence in INEC as an umpire.
Ume-Ezeoke warned that any government formed on the basis of the April 21 elections would not be recognized by ANPP, urging the international community to emulate Germany by not giving legitimacy to any government based on the presidential elections won by the PDP.
He demanded the immediate release of members of the party arrested by security agents on election day, adding that the party was ready to stand as surety for them.
On its part, the coalition of opposition parties urged all Muslims to pray in mosques across the country today, while Christians should follow suit in churches on Sunday.
"They should pray for the repose of the souls of all those who died while trying to defend their mandate, which was brazenly stolen by the PDP federal government in collusion with INEC and the security agencies," the coalition said.
Said NUD: "They should also pray for peace to reign in our land and for God to deliver Nigeria from the hands of evil people, who are bent on pushing the nation into an avoidable crisis just to satisfy their personal wishes.
"We believe that much as we will try our best efforts to ensure the cancellation of the last sham elections and the holding of fresh polls, it will eventually require God's intervention to resolve this matter."
The coalition said the prayers would mark the first stage of its programme to ensure that what all have now acknowledged as the most fraudulent elections in the history of the country do not stand.
"We will announce other planned activities at the appropriate time, suffice it to say that whatever we have planned will not endanger the lives of Nigerians but will be very emphatic in rejecting the outcome of the manipulated polls," it said.
NUD said it remained unshaken in its resolve to ensure that those who have willfully robbed Nigerians their votes and plunged the nation into a needless crisis will not rest until the elections had been cancelled.