The Director, Strategic Communications, Buhari Presidential Campaign Organisation, Mr. Dele Alake, has urged President Goodluck Jonathan not to succumb to the temptation of staying in office beyond May 29 if he loses the presidential election.
Alake said this in an article titled, “Mr. President; avoid the temptation to commit evil.”
He said although Jonathan had insisted that he would hand over if he lost the election, the statements being made by his loyalists and spokespersons were suspicious.
He said for instance, a recent video shows the Senior Special Assistant on Public Affairs to the President, Dr. Doyin Okupe, saying the Peoples Democratic Party will never hand over to the APC presidential candidate, Maj.Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (retd.).
Alake further warned that the allegations being made by former President Olusegun Obasanjo that Jonathan was planning to remain in power even if he lost should not be dismissed.
He said, “Indeed, the premise of President Obasanjo’s thesis is dramatically demonstrated in a viral video clip in which another spokesperson of President Jonathan, faced with the stiff resistance of Nigerians at a white-wash event in the United Kingdom, repeatedly shouted on top of his voice that the PDP will not allow Buhari to be president. ‘It will not happen! It will not happen! It will not happen!, said the hollering publicist to the anger of the audience.’
“This Freudian slip on the part of the reckless spokesman means the PDP has dissolved the Nigerian electorate and turned itself into the organ with the final verdict on an election it conspired to postpone ostensibly to give the electorate more opportunities to perform their civic duty.
“It means that the essence of the general elections, which is the presentation of alternatives so that the voters can make a choice, has been aborted ab initio. It means the ruling PDP is set to unleash a regime of civilian dictatorship or Cote d’Ivoire’s Laurent Gbagbo-like confusion and crises on the nation.”
Alake said the only way Jonathan would be able to convince Nigerians that he was not planning to sit tight, was to ensure that the elections were not postponed again.
