THE African Democratic Congress Presidential Campaign Council (ADC-PCC) has described the inauguration of an expanded All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential campaign council as a calculated attempt to impose a one-party dictatorship on Nigeria.
News Point Nigeria reports that in a statement issued on Wednesday, Kola Ologbondiyan, ADC-PCC Director of Media and Publicity, alleged that the ruling party was undermining Nigeria’s multiparty democracy by “coercing opposition governors into its fold or incorporating them into its presidential campaign council despite their refusal to defect from their respective political parties”.
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“What we are witnessing is not politics but political abduction,” he said.
“You cannot claim to be a democrat while using state power to force opposition governors into your party and then drafting them into your campaign council. This is political banditry.”
Ologbondiyan added that the APC was pursuing a political agenda that could concentrate power in the hands of one individual.
He said key national institutions, security agencies and the judiciary were being deployed to weaken opposition forces.
The ADC-PCC spokesperson urged Nigerians of conscience to resist what he described as an immoral political order driven by the desire to retain power at the expense of citizens’ welfare.
He accused the ruling party of showing little concern for the economic hardship, hunger and insecurity confronting ordinary Nigerians.
“These particular sets of leaders don’t care about the current conditions of the people but how best to remain in power at a time when average Nigerians find it difficult to eat and be secure,” he said.
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Ologbondiyan further alleged that Nigeria’s democracy was facing one of its most difficult periods, citing what he described as the suppression of dissenting voices, harassment of opposition figures and weakening of democratic institutions for partisan gain.
“Never in our democratic journey have we witnessed this level of intolerance and desperation. The APC government has weaponised poverty, hunger and insecurity to subjugate Nigerians and cripple the opposition. This is not the democracy for which Chief M.K.O. Abiola and other martyrs paid the supreme price,” he said.
He maintained that Atiku Abubakar, the ADC presidential candidate, and Rotimi Amaechi, his running mate, had the experience and credentials needed to restore democratic governance and reunite the country.
Describing Atiku as a committed democrat, Ologbondiyan said the former vice-president had the national reach and political experience to address Nigeria’s challenges and rebuild public confidence in democratic institutions.
“Atiku Abubakar is a democrat to the core. He has the national spread, the capacity and the will to reunite Nigeria and restore our battered democracy, which the APC has destroyed,” he said.
“The fate of Nigeria’s democracy rests on him to save it from total collapse.”
The ADC-PCC spokesperson called on Nigerians, media organisations, civil society groups and the international community to oppose what he described as the APC’s anti-democratic agenda and support efforts to protect multiparty democracy.
The APC announced an expanded list of its presidential campaign council on Tuesday, including Nyesom Wike, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT); Ademola Adeleke, Governor of Osun State; and Chukwuma Soludo, Governor of Anambra State.
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Wike was appointed coordinator of the party’s campaign in Rivers State and the FCT, while Soludo and Adeleke were named coordinators for Anambra and Osun states, respectively.
Adegboyega Oyetola, Minister of Marine and Blue Economy, was appointed deputy national coordinator for stakeholders’ mobilisation in the South-West.
