Presidential poll: Nigerian women storm Abuja, beg Atiku to concede defeat

Some Nigerian women on Friday stormed the city of Abuja to appeal to Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in the last election to congratulate his opponent, Muhammadu Buhari of the All Progressives Congress, and to concede defeat.

The Independent National Electoral Commission had declared Buhari of the APC winner of the keenly contested having scored the highest votes.

However, Atiku has vowed to go to court, alleging that the election was rigged.

The women, under the aegis of Two Million Woman Rally for Democracy in Nigeria, Peace and Stability kick-started their match at the Unity Fountain down to Hilton Area before proceeding to the Force headquarters, Eagle Square and back to Unity Fountain.

They called on Atiku to emulate former President Goodluck Jonathan and congratulate Atiku on his victory.

Speaking during the rally, the convener, Mary Onuche, called on Atiku to save Nigeria from anarchy and embrace his brother.

Onuche also called on Buhari not to disappoint Nigerians who have overwhelmingly voted him for another term.

Addressing the women, Onuche said “our democracy comes first before the personal fixations of any politician. We insist that the peace accord signed by political parties and their candidates, including Atiku must be respected.

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“We, therefore, call on Alhaji Atiku Abubakar to emulate the statesmanship of President Jonathan and quit his on-going disruptive stance on the election. There has been a series of calls on him to call and congratulate President Buhari as the winner of the election, which would infer that he would by consequence give up any legal challenge of the election result. We are tempted to align with the first half of this demand that Atiku calls President Buhari to offer his congratulations but we will not suggest that he forfeits his right to seek judicial redress. He is very free to approach the courts to ventilate his grievances.

The hostile environment being created by Atiku’s stance has been made even tenser by his reported demands on President Buhari, made through the National Peace Committee. Such behaviour suggests an opposition that has transmuted into a dictatorship, one that is hell-bent on blackmailing the country to impose itself on the people when it has been clearly rejected at the polls. This is not acceptable at a time when Nigerians expect that anyone that aspired to govern the country would at the very least imbibe the spirit of sportsmanship championed by former President Jonathan.

“While we remain apolitical, we are encouraged by the assessment of international election observation missions, which in spite of their earlier tilt in favour of Atiku prior to the election, have come out to declare that the conduct and the outcome of the poll was satisfactory to them.

“We suggest that Atiku takes time to slow down and listen to his foreign allies who have now concluded that even the Parallel Vote Tabulation they used as control showed that the PDP candidate was fairly defeated.

“We use this opportunity to passionately appeal to President Buhari that Nigerians did not repose their confidence in him for nothing. The second term they have given him in office should not become a basis for miscreants to destabilize the country in the guise of protesting for their candidate that fairly lost in an election.

“While Mr President must continue to urge his supporters to be civil in their jubilation at his victory and contemplative of the tasks ahead, members of the opposition must also be reminded that Nigeria has laws and the law enforcement agencies must be so instructed”.