The country’s major opposition party, the All Progressive Congress (APC) has told President Goodluck Jonathan what to expect from Ondo State people on March 28 presidential election.
The Ondo state chapter of the party in a statement issued on Monday by its Vice Chairman, Publicity Committee, Kunle Adebayo, said the people of the state would express their anger on President Jonathan in the Saturday presidential election by voting against his re-election, The Nation reports.
The party denied Governor Olusegun Mimiko’s claim that the people of the state preferred President Jonathan to the presidential candidate of the APC, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari.
The opposition party which described as self-deceit the governor’s assertion challenged him to point to a single federal project or intervention executed by the Jonathan-led administration in the state to prove the president’s commitment to the people.
Adebayo posited that instead of good life, Ondo people had suffered failed promises, poverty and dejection like other Nigerians under the PDP-led Federal Government.
He stated that the failure of the ruling party to touch their lives was the reason why the people turned to the APC and Buhari for redemption.
“Mimiko, in trying to mobilise traditional rulers, teachers, workers and youths, boasted to them that Jonathan’s new tenure will bear an indelible imprint on the lives of the Yoruba people and that his monumental achievements in his first four years are confounding and comforting to the people of Ondo state. The Point must be made again that Mimiko’s claims are not only an insult to the memory and intelligence of the people of the state; they are the antics of drowning men which all political opportunists are. How can Mimiko hope anybody in Ondo state, particularly the insulted workers, frustrated youths, betrayed women and dehumanized traditional rulers, was listening to his tales by the moonlight? In case he does not know, the people of Ondo state identify Jonathan as the President who treated them like a piece of trash in spite of the massive votes given to him in 2011 when he came whimpering as the then all begging, shoeless riverine boy,” he said.
Ondo State Governor, Olusegun Mimiko
The APC further took a swipe at Mimiko, saying: from inheriting a cash surplus of over N58.4 billion and zero debt profile, it is not news that he has plunged Ondo state to an unprecedented level of indebtedness, retrogression, poverty and stagnation.
It said as is customary with a bat pretending to be a bird, Mimiko’s empty boasts and politics of opportunism have by default exposed the futility of the PDP’s crave for permanent enslavement of Nigerians.
“Just as Ondo PDP under him has become a symbol of crisis, confusion, betrayal and corruption, every parent who means well for the future of her offspring has also decided to vote General Muhammadu Buhari who represents hope and rebirth,” Adebayo said.
Resident Electoral Commissioners of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) are threatening to expose state governors and top government officials offering them bribes.
The APC has told voters to ignore the directive of the Inspector-General of Police, Abba Suleiman, who directed voters to go home immediately after casting their votes in the forthcoming elections.
