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| President Obasanjo |
Here are the main cardinal points former President Olusegun Obasanjo outlined in his state of the nation address yesterday. Have a good read!
ON INEC
1. “Democracy becomes a sham if elections are carried out by people who should be impartial and neutral umpires, but who show no integrity...”
2. “The transmission and collation of results are subject to interference, manipulation, and meddling. If the INEC’s favorite political party wins with all the above infractions, the result will be conclusively declared and if not, there will be a ‘rerun’.”
3. “The track record of the present INEC is fairly sordid and all men and women of goodwill and believers in a democracy must be prepared for the worst from INEC and their encouragers...”
4. “Amina Zakari has become too controversial a figure to be able to give assurance of free, fair and credible election for INEC.”
5. “A judge does not sit in judgment over a case once he or she becomes a cause for controversy... Madam Amina Zakari should, in honor, stay out and not be seen as a source of contamination of the election.”
6. “Amina Zakari is not the only Commissioner that can be in the Collation Centre. Let the INEC Chairman act boldly and impartially and prove his absolute neutrality and responsiveness...”
ON BUHARI
7. “Some men of God would hold President Buhari to his word on free, fair, credible and peaceful elections. I am a realist... I am not persuaded by a track record of hollow words, impunity, insensitivity, and ‘I couldn’t care less’ attitude.”
8. “It is no use, at this juncture, to keep lamenting about the failure, incompetence, divisiveness, nepotism, encouragement, and condonation of corruption by Buhari administration...”
10. “President Buhari and his hatchet men in the coming election think that the judiciary must be primed in their favor. Hence, the Chief Justice of Nigeria... has been harassed and prosecuted...”
11. “President Buhari and his people believe no stone should be left unturned to rig Buhari in. It seems to be a ploy to intimidate the judiciary as a whole in preparation for all election cases that will go before them.”
12. “Buhari has succeeded in deceiving us the first time and we will be fools to allow ourselves to be deceived the second time.”
13. “Even when figures, facts, and statistics are made clear to Buhari, he keeps repeating what is untrue, either because he cannot understand or for mischief purposes and that places him on the level of a pathological liar.”
14. “[Buhari] believes he can get away with impunity and deceit as he seems to have done on many occasions in the past.”
15. “Bola Tinubu’s statement about Muhammadu Buhari in 2003 is fairly prophetic, “Muhammadu Buhari is an agent of destabilization, ethnic bigot and religious fanatic who, if given the chance, would ensure the disintegration of the country. His ethnocentrism would jeopardize Nigeria’s national unity.””
16. “Buhari’s watch can be likened to what we witnessed under Gen. Sani Abacha in many ways. When Abacha decided that he must install himself as Nigerian President by all means and at all costs, he went for broke and surrounded himself with hatchet men who on his order and in his interest and at high costs to Nigeria and Nigerians maimed, tortured and killed for Abacha.”
17. “...we have heard of how Buhari and his party are going about his own self-succession project. They have started recruiting collation officers who are already awarding results based on their projects to actualize the perpetuation agenda...”
18. Buhari’s “henchmen are working round the clock in cahoots with security and election officials to perfect their plan by computing results right from the ward to local government, state and national levels to allow him what will look like a landslide victory irrespective of the true situation...”
19. “The current plan is to drape the pre-determined results with a toga of credibility. It is also planned that violence of unimaginable proportion will be unleashed in high voting population areas across the country to precipitate re-run elections and where [Buhari] will be returned duly elected after concentration of security...”
20. “Buhari’s scheme bears eloquent testimony to this road similar to Abacha whom he has praised to high heavens and as an arch-supporter and beneficiary from Abacha, he has seen nothing wrong done by him. “
21. “It is clear from all indications that Buhari is putting into practice the lessons he learned from Abacha. Buhari has intimidated and harassed the private sector, attacked the National Assembly and now unconstitutionally and recklessly attacked and intimidated the Judiciary to cow them to submission.”
ON OSINBAJO
22. “Osinbajo must have gone for, “if you can’t beat them, join them”. A great pity indeed and which makes people ask the questions, “Any hope?”
23. “Osinbajo has shown the human weakness and proved the saying that the corruption of the best is the worst form of corruption.”
24. “What is the connection between taking the number of PVC of the ‘traders’ and the forthcoming election? There is something sinister about it, and Professor Osinbajo, of all people, should know that.”
ON DEMOCRACY
25. “This is a time for vigilance to fight to safeguard our votes and defend our democracy. The price of liberty and sustenance of our democracy is eternal vigilance and appropriate reaction to ward off iniquities... We must all be ready to pay that price and not relying on hollow words of callousness. The derailment of Nigerian democracy will be a monumental disaster comparable to the disaster of the Nigerian first military coup...Nigeria must not be allowed to slip off the democratic path nor go into anarchy and ruin. No individual or group has a monopoly of violence or gangsterism...”
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