Chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and Director General of the Voice f Nigeria (VON) Osita Okechukwu, has said that the main opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) should stop shopping for excuses they will tell Nigerians when they lose the 2019 election and concentrate on going about their campaign in a decent manner.
Reacting to Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) outrage over the appointment of Amina Zakari as chairperson of Election Collation Center, Okechukwu said the PDP should leave propaganda and concentrate more on what he described as real campaign.
He said: “One is constrained to advice the PDP to leave propaganda, stop shopping for excuses and concentrate more on real campaign. For the truth of the matter is that the electoral machine , card reader is one of the greatest antidotes to rigging invention. There is no way Hajia Amina Zakari can manipulate the card reader process. How can she alter or stop the results from Enugu, Ekiti, Bayelsa or even Jigawa or any other State for that matter?
“I laughed when I saw my friend Kola, spokesman of the PDP banging the table that Amina will manipulate the results. How? Is she going to be the Returning Officer? Is PDP agent going to sleep? Is there fear that he will be compromised by Amina?
My understanding is that Amina’s role is more administrative than electoral result management, pure and simple.”
Speaking on the none signing of the Electoral Act by President Muhammadu Buhari, Okechukwu retorted, “President Buhari is a fan and beneficiary of the card reader and was even the one who reminded the National Assembly of the omission of the card reader. The card reader process which starts with immeasurable accreditation mechanism has plugged up to 98% of the traditional method of rigging.
“Please ask yourself why politicians resorted to Vote-Buying? Vote-Buying is now the main vice of our electoral process, not ballot box snatching or other rigging methods. Card reader technology has plugged big loopholes of election rigging.”
On why he believes that the PDP will lose, he said, “the day His Excellency, Atiku Abubakar emerged in the primary, we celebrated it. We could have been more worried if Governor Tambuwal of Sokoto had won.
”Atiku’s baggage is heavy, integrity deficit huge and falls within the same age grade bracket in Igbo parlance with Mr President.” He didn’t present any major choice-wall to block Buhari. Even those who ordinarily don’t want Buhari cannot sincerely take Atiku as an alternative. (The Nation)
