PDP challenges APC to LG polls in controlled states to test popularity ‎

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on Sunday challenged the All Progressives Congress (APC) to immediately test its popularity among Nigerians by conducting free, fair and credible Local Government elections in states under its control.

The Party also hailed resounding victory in the just concluded local government election in Delta State in which it swept all the councils in the state.

This was contained in a statement made available to Newsmen in Abuja yesterday by its National Public Secretary, NPS, Hon Kola Ologbondiyan.

According to the statement, “We all know that the APC is mortally afraid of going into an election, particularly at the grassroots, as Nigerians across the board are bitter with them for their deceit and the wrecking of our once robust economy.

“Nigerians are also at pains over the poor welfare direction of the ruling party which has resulted in the penetrating hardship now being suffered under the APC controlled Federal Government misrule.

“The APC is petrified because Nigerians have renewed their interest in the PDP as the only genuine people-oriented party.

“This new thinking among Nigerians has been clearly demonstrated with PDP’s sweeping victory in Osun senatorial bye-election as well as the recent local council polls in Ekiti and Delta states.

“Today, the APC knows it cannot go back to the same electorate it scammed in 2015 with lies and empty promises; promises of bogus jobs, monthly stipends, free meals, free houses, reduction of fuel price, bringing the dollar to the same value with the naira and other phantom promises.

“The APC knows it cannot face the more than 8 million Nigerians it has rendered jobless with its reckless policies. They know that judgment awaits them from thousands of workers who were unjustly sacked in the states where APC governors rule, particularly Kogi and Kaduna.

“The APC cannot also return to the states where countless helpless families’ breadwinners painfully paid the supreme price due to untold hardship under their misrule.

“The party also knows it cannot return to the families of those slaughtered in Benue, Taraba, Adamawa, Borno and other parts of the country by marauders encouraged and emboldened by the indifference of the Federal Government and the unguarded comments from unpatriotic Presidential aides.

“That is why instead of facing the people, APC governors, who are now scared stiff of the looming disgrace awaiting them, are busy running to Abuja for help, forgetting that the President Muhammadu Buhari-led Presidency will also face an inevitable crushing defeat in 2019.

The fact is that Nigerians now know the difference between the anti-people, deceitful, inept APC and the democratic, development-driven PDP which, in its 16 years in power, led the nation to economic boom, cleared huge foreign debts, repositioned the banking sector, championed the telecoms revolution we all now enjoy, revamped the railways, built new universities, reformed the ports, facilitated unprecedented growth in small and medium enterprises and placed the
nation as a major global investment destination.

“The landslide victories of the PDP in the recent elections are therefore incontrovertible response by the people not only to the achievements of our government in the states but also to the ideological disposition of the PDP as one genuine democratic platform where all Nigerians are free to socially express, politically aspire and economically flourish.

“Our advice to the APC now is that they should stop deluding themselves with the electoral happenstance they earned by lies and propaganda in 2015 as Nigerians have now reconnected with their original political platform, the PDP, to move the nation forward come 2019”.