Seeking to cash in on Nigeria’s ruling Peoples Democratic Party’s string of missteps in recent times, the country’s opposition has described the party as ‘a perpetual source of emba rrassment to Nigeria’ and called on voters to send the party packing during next year’s general elections.
In a statement issued in Lagos on Sunday, the opposition Action Congress (AC) pa rty alleged that while ruling parties in other climes were the bastion of ideas that help to move their nations forward, ‘the PDP has been busy embarrassing the nation over mundane issues.’
To support its allegation, AC listed three recent events involving the PDP – the free-for-all in the lower House of Representatives that left some MPs injured; the public clash between the Senate President and the House Speaker over who sent a ‘doctored’ version of the constitutional reform bill to the 36 state Houses of Assembly and the fact that the PDP disagreed with President Goodluck Jonathan on the appointment of a new electoral boss.
‘To cap a string of shameful shows, the PDP has now turned against its own leader, President Goodluck Jonathan, calling him a liar for daring to say the party, which by the way is a rigging machine, was afraid of the new boss of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Attahiru Jega.
‘If anyone was in doubt that things have indeed fallen apart under the tattered PDP umbrella, such people should by now have shaken off such doubt,’ AC said.
The party called on the nation’s anti-graft agencies to investigate the allegations of corruption against the leadership of the House of Representatives, that triggered the fight among MPs.
‘The free-for-all by the lawmakers in the House, constituted 80 per cent by the PDP, is not about bringing food to the table for hungry Nigerians or quenching their thirst through the provision of potable water, it is about those among them who have front seats on the gravy train,’ it said