The Federal Government yesterday warned
against what it called utterances capable of causing disaffection,
apparently referring to General Muhammadu Buhari’s comments predicting a
standoff in the event of rigged elections in 2015.
Buhari told a visiting Niger State CPC delegation on Monday that crisis
could result from the next general elections because the people would no
longer tolerate rigging.
Information Minister Labaran Maku,
who spoke at the State House in Abuja yesterday after the Federal
Executive Council meeting, said it was undemocratic to provoke people to
violence. But he said the council did not discuss Buhari.
“In no major nations of the world will
politicians or parties urge people to go and fight in polling stations
or defend their votes or threaten violence because democracy is
civility,” he said.
Maku added: “We all know the
consequences of violence in politics. We all know the consequences of
lives lost in pursuit of ambitions and the nation is going through a
period now that is critical and it is important that all of us who are
critical stakeholders in the Nigerian project should weigh whatever we
say such that it would aid national unity, national development and will
aid peace particularly now in Northern Nigeria.
“Any statement that is made not only by
politicians all Nigerians have a duty to ensure greater peace, greater
civility in our polity because civility is important. The difference
between democracy and other forms of government is that democracy is
civil.”
He said the law provided ways for aggrieved people to seek redress.
“We are seeing the consequences of lack
of peace in our community. At this time it is not about the Federal
Government, it is the responsibilities of all Nigerians particularly
those that God has elevated to positions of responsibility in the
polity,” he said.
CPC says Jonathan instigating CAN against Buhari
Buhari’s party, the Congress for
Progressive Change (CPC), yesterday fired back at the Presidency over
its reaction to comments by the former head of state.
President Jonathan’s spokesman Reuben
Abati on Tuesday condemned Buhari’s statement on 2015 and labelled him a
section leader. He said also Buhari was wrong to have said the Federal
Government is the biggest Boko Haram.
In a statement in Abuja yesterday, CPC
spokesman Rotimi Fashakin said Jonathan is the most sectional-inclined
leader as all his oil ministers so far are his Ijaw kinsmen.
He said also that Jonathan’s swift exoneration of MEND in the October 1, 2010 bombing was symptomatic of a sectional leader.
“Third, so far… Jonathan has shown very
generous affinity for Nigerians of Ijaw stock in terms of appointments
and promotions in the Federal Public sector. There is a marked
lopsidedness that smacks of clannishness and ethnocentrism by the
President,” he added.
“On corruption and sleazy tendency, the
Jonathan administration transcends all others before it! Nigerians are
still befuddled by the impeachable show of arbitrariness by the regime
in expending N2.67 trillion on fuel subsidy instead of the appropriated
N240 billion in the 2011 appropriation act.”
Fashakin said Buhari’s statement that
the Federal Government is the biggest Boko Haram was referring to the
tendencies of trying to provoke ethno-religious pogrom in the name of
Boko Haram.
“We are also aware about how the
Jonathan administration has consistently used the Christian Association
of Nigeria (CAN) under the leadership of his fellow Niger-delta
Nigerian, Pastor Ayo Oritsejafor, to demonize (Buhari) in the despicable
attempt to veil the murderous intent of the administration,” he said.
ACN backs Buhari, flays Presidency
The Action Congress of Nigeria yesterday
joined the fray, saying it was in support of Buhari’s statement that
2015 elections must be credible.
Spokesman for the party Lai Mohammed
said in a statement that there was no justification for the “crude,
vitriolic and impudent verbal attack (on Buhari) for no other reason
than his timely warning against election rigging in 2015.”
“The statement for which Gen. Buhari is
now being mercilessly savaged was nothing but a warning against those
who may be planning to rig the 2015 general elections, hence should not
have rankled anyone who believes in free, fair and transparent polls,”
Mohammed said.
“We hold no brief for anyone. But it is
true that if elections are rigged, as they have been so shamelessly and
brazenly done by the PDP since 1999, naturally people will react, and in
doing so it is impossible for anyone to predict how far things can
go.... If the presidency and the PDP have no intention to rig in 2015,
why are they so worried about the consequences of such action?”
Referring to what he called insults
hurled on Buhari by Abati, Mohammed said Presidency statements must use
“civilised and elevating language, rather than beer parlour and
unguarded phrases…. The insults heaped on Gen. Buhari, a former Head of
State, for merely exercising his right to freedom of speech is totally
unacceptable and run against the tenets of decorum and mature political
discourse.”
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