Rivers polls: PDP accuses APC of intimidation

By Lateef Ibrahim Abuja

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has decried what it called the unrelenting use of security forces, including special police and military units, by the All Progressives Congress (APC), to subjugate Nigerians and provide cover for their thugs to unleash violence, disrupt polling processes and foist fake results at elections.
Such brazen assault on the will of the people, particularly as witnessed in the last Saturday’s Rivers state Assembly bye-election, the party said, is completely provocative, incendiary and has an unlimited capacity to elicit violent resistance from the people and derail our hard-earned democracy, especially as we approach the 2019 general election.
The opposition said this in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Mr Kola Ologbondiyan on Monday in Abuja.
According to the PDP, “We invite Nigerians to note that the use of security agencies by the APC to aid the subjugation of the people has become a regular practice as amply witnessed in the July 14, 2018 Ekiti governorship election, the 2016 Edo state governorship election, the bye-elections in Kogi, Bauchi, Katsina and Cross Rivers and most recently, the River state Assembly bye-election, where special police units were used to manhandle voters, while providing cover for APC thugs to attack voters, snatch ballot boxes and disrupt the election.
“The APC, in its desperation, is resorting to this underhand means, because it knows that there is no way it can win in any peaceful and transparently conducted election in any part of the country, due to the public indignation against its dismal performance in the last three years.
“Our worry as a party, however, is that Nigerians are daily pushed to the wall and there is a limit to what they can endure, without resorting to violent resistance, particularly in the face of unrelenting subversion of their will and freedom to select leaders or representatives of their choice.
“The APC and its agents in the police and other security agencies should therefore bear in mind that they are on collision course with the people. Their eventual resistance, if such subversion continues, could come with very dire consequences.
“The PDP is aware that this resort to violence by the APC is to test-run its plans to rig the 2019 general elections and we ask, what shall it profit a man to gain political power and set his nation ablaze?
“Finally, the PDP cautions all those being used by the APC to know that history will never forgive them for these atrocities. They will forever be remembered for their ignoble past and have their places in the hall of shame,” it said.