Lamido, Daniel accuse APC of intimidating opposition members , fault anti-graft war

….As ex Ogun Governor eyes PDP national chairmanship

Lateef Ibrahim, Abuja

Former Governor of Jigawa State, Alhaji Sule Lamido, on Thursday hit hard at the governing All Progressives Congress, APC, describing it as an alliance of failures who are using force and other unconstitutional means to intimidate members members of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.

This is even as the former Ogun State governor, Otunba Gbenga Daniel noted with regrets that the issue of the anti-corruption war by the federal government has been unduly politicized.

Both Lamido and Daniel spoke at separate engagements they had with members of the conference of former PDP Speakers in Abuja.

The former Jigawa State Governor alleged that the President Muhammadu Buhari administration had no clues on how to fix the economy.

He charged PDP members to remain united against the oppressive tendencies of the Buhari-led government who he noted had resorted to nepotism as a way of running the country.

Lamido specifically told PDP members to be , “courageous and stand up. Nigeria has been around before APC and it will be around after APC.

“APC cannot take us hostage. We need to stand up. We need people to be courageous.

“We shall not keep quiet. It is our country. Enough of this culture of nepotism and fear. Governemt should be respected not feared. Government should be there for all of us, whether APC and PDP. 2019 will be a defining moment for Nigeria”, he said.

Alhaji Lamido, while reacting to yesterday’s declaration of Ekiti State Governor, Mr Ayodele Fayose, for the 2019 presidency on the platform of PDP, declared that he (Fayose) is constitutionally entitled to contest the presidential ticket of the PDP, even though it has been zoned to the North.

On his part, the former governor of Ogun State Otumba Daniels faulted the allegations from the ruling APC that members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) members were corrupt, saying that corruption is not partisan.

The former governor, who pointed out that a majority of All Progressive Congress (APC) leaders and members were in the PDP before their defection, wondered why the APC should tag PDP as corrupt when it is clear that from the evidence from security agencies, people from other parties were also fingered.

Otunba Daniel, who is fondly called OGD, spoke while addressing members of the conference of former PDP Speakers on his intention to view for the Chairmanship if the party.

He pointed out that PDP lost the last election because the party veered from their original vission which was power to the people, became complacent.and took the people for granted.

According to him, “after the last election, we became over confident and took the people for granted. Power was removed from the people. Leaders were disconnected from followers. Candidates were imposed on the people.

The PDP, he however said, still has better chances to take over the Presidency if the party is able to reorganize itself as the world is waiting for its come back.

His words, “It was when PDP took away power from the people that the party started loosing. Party reorganization is a sine-qua-non for election victory.

“The world is waiting for us. Put your acts ttogether, put your house together. We have been labelled as being corrupt but the truth is that corruption is Nigeria is not partisan.

“On the empirical evidence in the road, I cannot say that our party is more corrupt than the others” he said.
Daniel explained that while he was the governor of Ogun State he built a permanent state secretariat on a hectre of land with offices for all the zonal chairman, a feat yet to be replicated by any state.

He said that his investment in infrastructure has not been equalled in the state, even though the present administration is building fly-overs that leads to no where. He equally claimed that he hosted the best National
Sports festival in 2006 and made a profit of N90 million which has not been equalled by any state till date.

He argued that party members must come out of their psychological deafeat and reallign to form a formidable party that will sack APC in 2019.

“We must be out of our psychological suppression that we lost the 2015 election. PDP need to have an able and capable leader. Building PDP is building democracy and when you build democracy in Nigeria, you build democracy in Africa” Daniel said.