Polls: APC importing security services uniforms, recruiting thugs, planning to release prisoners – PDP

Polls: APC importing security services uniforms, recruiting thugs, planning to release prisoners – PDP

•Allegations baseless –Amaechi
By Henry Umoru
AHEAD of the general elections slated for March 28 and April 11, the national leadership of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has alleged that the opposition All Progressives Congress, APC, has concluded plans to import security service uniforms and recruit thugs for the polls, just as it said that the deployment of military to safeguard our elections was not new and must continue.
Addressing journalists in Abuja, yesterday, the PDP, through its Deputy National Chairman, Prince Uche Secondus, also accused the APC of plotting to release prisoners, especially in Rivers State, to participate in the elections, even as he stressed  that the APC was a propaganda freak such that every issue it raises  must be propaganda, to malign and blackmail the PDP.
In a response, Amaechi described the allegations as “irresponsible, repugnant and contemptuous.”
The ruling party claimed the APC was not campaigning to win the election, saying it has started mobilising public opinion in readiness for what it termed, an orchestrated strategy to discredit the result of the election. It added that the APC has commenced this line of action with contrived polling results they had bombarded the international and domestic media with even prior to the campaigns claiming that it would defeat the ruling party.

Secondus, who noted that the PDP was prepared for the election before the postponement from February 14 and still prepared, said that the party would win the election, just as he said that a vote for the PDP was a vote for continuity. “We alert Nigerians to the seriousness of these plots. While the PDP is making effort to sell its manifesto to Nigerians, the APC is busy perfecting schemes that would derail our democracy. If they don’t win, they are trying to cause disaffection within the security services, inciting one religion against their own country.
“But you see the APC is a propaganda freak that on every issue, there must be propaganda in order to malign and blackmail the PDP. It is not correct, rather it is them who are cooking up these stories in order to cause confusion in the country”.
He warned the APC against pushing the country crisis that enveloped Nigeria in the past.
On APC and  deployment of soldiers, he said, “ It isn’t new, it has been done before, soldiers aren’t involved in elections, but they are kept in strategic places to safeguard the nation. Whoever that is afraid of the security provided by the army or the police and want to have their own private army to conduct the election, is the one that wants to throw this country into crisis.
Don’t forget that the United States has predicted that there would be no country in 2015, God forbid”.
When asked on the Rivers State crisis, Secondus noted that Governor Rotimi Amaechi was the problem and alleged that he was sewing uniforms and planning to release prisoners for the election.
On Amaechi’s allegation that some pastors were bribed with N6 billion by the PDP, the PDP Deputy National Chairman, who asked the governor to come up with names of those involved, said, “But the other pastors and bishops are asking, name the person who received the money? You don’t make wide allegation. Ameachi, the onus is on him to name the person who received it and the bank or where the money is.
“But let me tell you, this is aimed at causing confusion in the body of Christ”.
Meanwhile, Amaechi said, last night, Secondus “danced naked in the market square as he  continued on his grossly irresponsible, repugnant and contemptuous, albeit, feckless mission of denigrating and disparaging the person and office of the Governor of Rivers State and the Chairman of the Nigerian Governors’ Forum(NGF).”
“Secondus, who has woefully failed the state and its people, shamelessly told a press conference in Abuja that Governor Amaechi is the main problem of the state, amongst other reckless, spurious allegations,” a statement by Rivers State Government House last night said.
“This is the same Secondus who, just a couple of years back, hailed Governor Amaechi as the best thing to happen to Rivers State.
“Rivers people know that it’s rather Secondus and this PDP cabal that are obviously our problem. They want to return Rivers State and its people to the dark days of the pre – Amaechi.
“Contrary to the wild claims of Prince Secondus, Governor Amaechi has never and will never be in alliance with cultists. It is a known fact, nationally and internationally, that when he became Governor in 2007, Amaechi chased away these cultists from Rivers State. Many were arrested and prosecuted. He openly condemned them and their criminal activities that had then ruined the economic, social and political life of the State. How can this same Amaechi now be in bed with the same cultists he condemned, fought, arrested, prosecuted and chased way from Rivers State?  That is simply not possible.”