PDP, APC trade punches as Tinubu, Atiku begin campaigns

The All Progressives Congress (APC) yesterday dismissed as day dreaming suggestions by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) that the ruling party had no validly nominated candidates for the 2023 presidential, governorship and national/state assembly elections.

National Publicity Secretary of the opposition party, Mr. Debo Ologunagba, had claimed during a press conference to herald the take-off of the PDP presidential campaign on Monday that the APC “has no legally valid candidate for the 2023 general elections.”

He hinged his statement on the September 30, 2022 judgment of a Federal High Court, Abuja that nullified the candidature of Osun State Governor Gboyega Oyetola in the July election on the grounds that his nomination was invalid, having been conducted and submitted by Yobe Governor Mai Mala Buni, in violation of Section 183 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended).

“For emphasis, Section 183 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended) provides that a state governor “shall not, during the period when he holds office, hold any other executive office or paid employment in any capacity whatsoever,” Ologunagba had said.

But reacting to the PDP position last night, the Deputy Director (Legal) of the APC Presidential Campaign Council, Mr. Babatunde Ogala (SAN), said the opposition party’s argument had no basis whatsoever.

He challenged the PDP to file actions not only against the APC presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, but also against all APC candidates for the governorship, National Assembly and Houses of Assembly candidates, if the party indeed meant what it said.

Spokesman of the APC Presidential Campaign Council and Minister of State, Labour and Employment, Festus Keyamo (SAN), branded the PDP claim as pure hallucination.

Ogala said the PDP would meet its Waterloo in court just as it would be roundly defeated at the polls.

He said the court judgment cited by the PDP had already been appealed by Governor Oyetola and wondered why the party (PDP) would not wait for the decision of the Appeal Court on the matter.

He said Oyetola’s ground of appeal is that the judgment is a violent repudiation of the Supreme Court ruling on Eyitayo Jegede versus Akeredolu case when the apex court held that since Akeredolu was validly nominated by the APC, the issue of who sent his name to INEC was immaterial.

The APC chief said in law, each case is decided on its merit and could not understand how the PDP in its infantile imagination would now, on the basis of the Jegede case that it lost, be making wild claims.