As the nation prepares for the 2019 general election, the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Niger State has said that rigging of election is no longer possible because Nigerians are now wiser and more politically conscious.
Speaking during a personality interview platform organised by the state chapter of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), “Watch House Forum” Wednesday, the state chairman of the party, Alhaji Jibrin Imam, said the performance and non performance of political parties and their candidates would be the determining factors for victories or otherwise in the 2019 elections and subsequent ones.
“The challenge of winning elections in 2019 will be enormous because Nigerians are now wiser and more politically sophisticated more so now that rigging is impossible.
“We (APC) will ride on our achievements to win election,” Jibrin said.
He said “Facebook and textbook” critics of the administration were only “wasting their time, they are only campaigning for us”.
According to him, President Muhammadu Buhari and the Niger State Governor, Alhaji Abubakar Sani Bello, have performed tremendously that their records are enough to guarantee victory for the party in 2019.
“We are happy with Mr President. We are happy with what he is doing. That is why we all endorsed him for a second term.
“What we have now is unprecedented in the history of Nigeria, not less than N3 trillion had been spent on development of infrastructure across the country.
“The anti-corruption drive of government has taken root. Nigerians are happy about this crusade,” the APC chieftain said.
Asked to comment on the threat by some members of the party who termed themselves nPDP to defect to other parties, he said that there was nothing like nPDP.
“As far as I know, there is only one APC. There is nothing like nPDP in APC it is an absurdity,” he said.
He expressed confidence in the ability of the new national chairman of the party Adams Oshiomhole to reconcile aggrieved members of the party because ” Oshiomole is a goal getter. He can midwife the party and give it a facelift”.
Jibrin also said that it was not easy to fight insurgency because insurgents always adopted guerilla tactics for their operations.
He advised Nigerians to “change their mindsets by reporting criminal cases to security agencies. Citizens should be the ones to give information, security operatives are not ghosts”.
