APC urges PDP not to stain them with their indelible badge of shame

The ruling All Progressives Congress APC urged the opposition Peoples Democratic Party PDP on Tuesday not to contaminate it with the latter’s indelible emblem of dishonour and treachery over claimed judicial pronouncements on the outcomes of the 2023 general election.

The APC’s spokesman, Felix Morka, was responding to the PDP’s Monday statement, which accused the APC of forming a committee to push or even pressure the judiciary to do the ruling party’s bidding.

The APC statement reads; “In convulsive reactions to recent court judgements upturning some electoral victories won illegally by its members, the Peoples Democratic Party PDP and its presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, have taken their attack of our judicial system to a whole new and unacceptable level of contemptuous recklessness.

“In two separate statements yesterday, November 20, 2023, one by Atiku and the other by the party itself, the PDP, yet again, spewed their baseless allegations that the judiciary was under pressure from an imaginary committee set up to secure judicial outcomes in favour of the All Progressives Congress APC. Like a badly broken record, Atiku repeated his bogus claim that the opposition was being muzzled to pave the way for a one-party state.

“Ours is a progressive Party that subscribes unreservedly to the honoured fundamental constitutional principle of separation of powers, and abiding commitment to the independence of the judiciary. The PDP is bereft of these values and, sadly, they cannot imagine a ruling party with a modus operandi that is quite unlike its crooked, ruthless, lawless old self in power. APC is not the PDP and should not be tainted with the PDP’s indelible badge of dishonour and disloyalty to the rule of law and constitutional democracy.

“To be clear, at no time was any committee empanelled or tasked with exerting any kind of pressure on the Justices of any court regarding electoral or any matters. Under previous and present APC administrations, the judiciary has demonstrated extreme courage, vibrancy and independence of thought and action as empowered by the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. And we urge that they continue to do so despite the PDP’s strident attempts to discredit, blackmail and cow the judiciary to execute its electoral whims and caprices.

“Atiku and his PDP are deservedly haunted by ghosts from their inglorious past. Their unjustified war of attrition against the judiciary is despicable and condemnable. The proposition that when the PDP wins in court, democracy is healthy and the judiciary vibrant, but when verdicts come down against them, then the judiciary and other democratic institutions must be dismantled at their behest, is vain, senseless and a flagrant disregard for basic tenets of the rule of law and constitutionalism.

“In 2019, courts upturned the electoral victories of the APC Governor of Zamfara and members of the House of Assembly members and handed victory to the PDP. Again, in Rivers State, our party’s candidates for all elective positions were barred from contesting, paving the way for a sweeping victory for the PDP. Worse still, our party lost the Governorship of Bayelsa state to the PDP by force of a court judgement. In all, we never called the integrity of the judiciary into question.

“But when the same judiciary, relying on the same laws of our land, renders judgements in favour of our great Party, the PDP goes berserk, spewing gibberish and peddling barefaced falsehoods. Ostensibly, the PDP has lost the capacity to manage its affairs and frustrations and now lashes out, unjustifiably, at our veritable democratic institutions.

“Again we strongly recommend that the PDP undergoes advanced institutional therapy, purge itself of base and anti-democratic proclivities, and reorganize for mature and responsible opposition politics or wind down altogether”.