The Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) on Tuesday said the Peoples’ Democratic Party-led government was planning to humiliate key opposition party leaders.
The party said this was not unconnected to the plan by leading opposition parties to present a common ground in the 2015 general elections.
In a statement issued in Lagos, ACN spokesman Lai Mohammed said the plot was targeted at ACN leader Bola Tinubu, his CPC counterpart General Muhammadu Buhari, as well as their close allies.
Mohammed said: “Asiwaju Bola Tinubu is particularly a prime target of these evil machinations, because of his status as the leader of the country’s second biggest party, his progressive credentials as well as his electoral value.”
He accused the ruling party of wanting to “cripple the opposition, by ensuring that nothing will be left of the integrity of its key leaders even if they are fortunate to make it to 2015.”
“Some key government agencies have also been co-opted to dig up any dirt they hope can be plastered on the targeted leaders, while foreign intelligence agencies have been contacted in a desperate attempt to unearth any information that can be used to discredit and disgrace these major opposition figures thus distracting them from the merger plans.”
“Indications are that highly-combustible sectional and religious issues, that are being manipulated by desperate forces to divide and destroy, are not off the table as long as exploiting them can shut down the opposition. Or how else does one interpret a recent PDP statement that President Goodluck Jonathan is being criticized by the opposition because he is from a minority ethnic group?,” he queried.
“And what about the continuous efforts, which have failed so far, to portray a key opposition leader as a sponsor of Boko Haram? His nomination as a ‘facilitator’ of some phantom peace talks was not an accident, but was carefully choreographed to portray him as a religious zealot and terrorist not fit to preside over the affairs of the nation.”
The spokesman added that the emerging coalition would not be cowed into dropping its unified position to legally oust the present administration in 2015.
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