Sheriff working to make Nigeria one-party state under APC —Makarfi

THE chairman of the caretaker committee of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Senator Ahmed Makarfi has alleged plans by Senator Ali Modu Sheriff to plunge the nation into a one-party state under the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Makarfi was reacting to the press conference by the Senator Sherriff faction on Friday, where he accused them of deliberately “raising insinuations that could affect the judgment pending before the Appeal Court in Port Harcourt and also discrediting the judiciary.”

He said such stance taken by Senator Sherriff and his supporters “could ultimately destroy the judiciary and later plunge Nigeria into a one-party state.”

In a statement in Kaduna on Saturday, Makarfi said:  “You recall that the Sherriff side has made several wild written petitions and allegations against members of the bench in a reckless and ungentlemanly manner, unsubstantiated allegations, all intended to avert the delivery of justice.

“And this ongoing insinuation, all intended to make nonsense of the judiciary, especially in respect of judgments that are yet to be delivered. Insinuating as if they already have judgments in their pockets. We truly don’t know what they intend to achieve by this.

“We as caretaker committee of the PDP have absolute faith and confidence in the judiciary and we know that ultimately justice will be done, the judges cannot be fooled by these antics.”

“We equally believe that as democrats, we will continue to depend on the judiciary as the institution that can protect its own integrity and I believe that they are capable of doing that.

“I urge them to rise up to the challenge and do that. If we destroy judiciary in this country, we will destroy democracy and we will destroy Nigeria.

“At the sometime, if we destroy judiciary in Nigeria, we will enthrone dictatorship and nobody will be safe. God forbid the day that opposition will be killed in the country and we will end up in the state of a dictatorship. We will stand up against that and we will continue to stand up against such.”

He also added: “The Sherriff faction press conference is pre-emptive of what the court judgment would be. This is not the first time, several times, through social media, even when issues were at the lower courts, they made perceived and conjectured outcome of court proceedings and in most cases they never got it right. It was at one instance of a particular judge that they got it right. The intention is to erode the integrity of the judiciary.”

The PDP chairman added that “equally, they have joined even judges as respondents to cases they have filed before the court. Really, this is against ethics and norms that known to us.