Tinubu’s media aide released a press statement with full confidence, asking Peter Obi of Labour Party to go to court if he has proof of fraud and feels that he was cheated in the election.
The press statement simply reads:
We watched with dismay today’s press conference held by the Labour Party’s Presidential candidate, Mr. Peter Obi, during which he made bizarre and outlandish claims about the outcome of the recently concluded Presidential and National Assembly elections, in which he came in second place, according to the results declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission.
We applaud Mr. Obi’s decision to seek redress in court as an aggrieved party if he is convinced of the evidences of alleged electoral fraud he will present before the tribunal.
Going to court is part of the electoral process, and it is the most dignified, statesmanlike, and civilized way to proceed.
We applaud the decision. It is unquestionably preferable to mobilizing supporters and inciting social unrest.
Contrary to what he claims, the election held on February 25th was free and fair.
The 2023 election will be one of the most transparent and peaceful in Nigerian history.
Because the process was credible, Mr. Obi’s Labour Party was able to receive more than six million votes, contrary to pre-election predictions.
That Labour Party and Mr. Obi surprised bookmakers by winning in Lagos State, Nasarawa, Plateau, Delta, and Edo, where either the All Progressives Congress or the Peoples Democratic Party has a governorship. These governors have firmly established political machinery.
The fact that Obi won attests to the legitimacy of the election process.
In those states, the majority of the sitting governors ran for Senate and were defeated by unknown candidates from the Labour Party.
The Labour Party also swept all five South East states previously controlled by APGA, PDP, or APC.
We believe the Labour Party Presidential Candidate contradicted himself and exposed himself to public ridicule by claiming that the election was only credible in states and locations won by his party.
We need to warn Mr. Obi that when he gets to court, he should be prepared to tell the world how his party received over 90% of the votes in his South East region while other parties received almost nothing.
We have evidence of voter suppression, intimidation, and harassment in the South East, particularly among those who voted for our party.
Mr. Obi will also have to persuade the court of his allegation of rigging in over 40,000 polling units across the country, particularly in the North West and North East, where his party had no party agents and did not sign result sheets as required by law.
Because Labour Party is a PDP affiliate, we believe it will enlist PDP agents to prove its fraud claims.
We would like to reiterate for the umpteenth time that Mr. Obi did not and could not have won the presidential election under any circumstances.
This is because, in a multi-ethnic and multi-religious society like Nigeria, where a candidate running in a national election must appeal to a cross-section of our pluralistic society, he had no chance of winning a national election.
Mr. Obi based his presidential campaign on the failed ethnicity and religion strategy, the divisive and dangerous politics that has hampered our country’s progress for decades. Nigerians simply voted to reject an ethnic and religious bigot.
Throughout his campaign, Mr. Obi positioned himself as the candidate of Christians and the Church, seeking to “reclaim their country” from Nigerian Muslims.
His campaign was also powered by ethnicity, inciting strong Igbo sentiments. He also attempted to capitalize on the alleged youth discontent in Nigeria, which was fueled by the ENDSARS protest in 2020.
While the Labour Party positioned its candidate as the gatherer of youth votes, its strategists overlooked the fact that Nigeria does not have a homogeneous and monolithic youth population capable of delivering bloc votes to any candidate.
All of the major parties that ran in the election had a strong youth appeal and support.
Mr. Obi’s election defeat teaches us that no politician in Nigeria can win a presidential election by being a sectional and anointed candidate of any religion.
God designed our country in such a way that no part of it can exist apart from the other.
Our country’s framers also worked to bind our country together by including provisions that make it impossible for one section of the country or religion to have political dominance over another.
This means that any politician seeking the presidency of Nigeria must have a pan-Nigeria appeal and strong support, as well as the support of adherents of other religions.
Mr. Obi and his colleagues understood why they had failed.
With their negative and dangerous campaign, they knew they had no chance of winning.
We owe the Labour Party and Peter Obi the truth: they lost the election.
This reality cannot be obliterated by red herrings and misinformation about the election and its outcome.
In a free, fair, and credible election, the President-Elect, who was our party’s candidate, won a Pan-Nigeria mandate.
He is eager to take office so that he can serve the people of our country with integrity and honor.
Bayo Onanuga
Director, Media & Publicity
APC Presidential Campaign Council
March 2, 2023
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