The All Progressives Congress (APC) has asked President Jonathan to put his words about free and fair elections in the country into concrete actions and ensure that the elections are not marred by the intimidation and harassment of opposition party members and supporters.
This was made known in a statement issued in Lagos on Monday by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed asking the president to prevent deliberate disenfranchisement of voters, which hallmarked the Anambra and Ekiti gubernatorial elections, among others during the election.
According to the statement: ”On the same day the President’s latest assurances of a free, fair, credible and transparent elections in 2015 were being reported, agents of the Jonathan-led federal government were ransacking the offices of a company hired to carry out an opinion poll for Osun State ahead of the 9 Aug. gubernatorial election.
”If the opposition can no longer freely carry out opinion polls, if the companies hired to carry out such polls are harassed and intimidated by SSS officials as they did to tnsrms, the offices of which were searched for six hours, after which top officials of the firm were dragged to the SSS offices in Shangisha and computers carted away, then how can any President convince anyone that free and fair elections can be held under his watch?
”If the Ngozi Okonjo Iweala-linked NOI polling firm has never been harassed for its choreographed opinion polls that favour the Jonathan Administration, why should other firms be subjected to the kind of Gestapo- tactics that tnsrms was exposed to? This is why we are asking President Jonathan to walk to talk,” APC said.
The party said that already, the foundation was being laid to rig next month’s governorship election in Osun at source, as INEC has been frustrating attempts by APC members to obtain their Permanent Voters Cards, even as the PDP has continued to boast that it will again use the military to illegally shut down the state and bully the opposition in Osun, just like it did in Ekiti.
NAIJ.
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