The All Progressives Congress, APC, Presidential Campaign Council has declared that it has no plan to stop the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, from contesting the outcome of the just-concluded presidential election.
Spokesperson of the council, Festus Keyamo, said Abubakar was free to seek legal redress because it’s his constitutional right.
The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, had declared President Muhammadu Buhari winner of the election, ahead of Abubakar.
Displeased with INEC’s announcement, Abubakar had vowed to seek legal redress.
Against this backdrop, a group known as the Buhari Campaign Organisation, BCO, enjoined Abubakar to concede defeat and not go to court.
However, Keyamo dismissed the group’s position, saying that such call was not emanating from the council.
In a statement he signed and availed DAILY POST, Keyamo said: “Our attention has been drawn to some news item and posts on social media reporting that we wrote a letter to some international bodies to prevail on Alhaji Atiku Abubakar not to proceed to court to challenge the result of the 2019 Presidential Election.
“Our investigation reveals that a letter to that effect was purportedly written by a certain ‘Buhari Campaign Organisation’. This is the second time we will be informing the public that the said ‘Buhari Campaign Organisation’ does not act at the behest of the APC Presidential Campaign Council nor does it represent the Muhammadu Buhari Campaign Organisation in any way. As a result, whatever it has released DOES NOT REPRESENT THE POSITION OF THE APC PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN COUNCIL OR PRESIDENT MUHAMMADU BUHARI.
“Our official position is that we believe that Alhaji Atiku Abubakar has a constitutional right to seek redress in court and we do not seek in any way to curtail that right. In fact, it is the resort to court that is the only democratic way to ventilate his perceived grievance and any attempt to restrict or discourage the exercise of such right would be an invitation to anarchy.
“In addition, we are very anxious to meet Alhaji Atiku Abubakar in court in order to show the world in a conclusive manner the free and fair nature of the comprehensive defeat of Atiku at the polls. An election is not termed ‘rigged’ only by the mere claim of it by the loser. That is what Atiku and the PDP want to ram down our throats. Unfortunately for them, international, continental and sub-regional observers (who can be seen as neutral by all standards) ALL declared the election to be free, fair and credible. No ego-massaging narrative can change that.
“We therefore totally disassociate ourselves from the letter purportedly written by one of, perhaps, many support groups of President Muhammadu Buhari. They may have a right to their opinion, but it does not represent our official position.”
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