Osun Election: PDP accuses Buhari of secretly releasing N16 billion Paris Club fund to Aregbesola
By Nnaemeka Chukwujindum
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has accused President Muhammadu Buhari of fueling corruption by secretly releasing of over N16.6 billion Paris Club fund to Osun State ahead of the September 22 governorship election in the state.
The party said investigations carried out by it showed that the money is to be diverted as bribe to INEC officials, compromise international observers as well as “pay hoodlum contracted by the All Progressives Congress (APC) in its desperate plot to rig the September 22, 2018 Osun Governorship elections”.
In a statement issued on Saturday by Kola Ologbondiyan, its National Publicity Secretary, the party said it was reprehensible that President Buhari, portrayed by his aides as a man of integrity, “could approve such dark scheme to convert funds meant for payment of several months’ arrears of workers’ salaries to bribe electoral officers and pay thugs to foist a rejected leadership on an already impoverished people.”
“Further investigation reveals that bulk of the money has already been penciled for sharing to APC leaders, especially at the national level, as bribe, to short-circuit the system to favour President Buhari’s relection bid, while the people of Osun continue to suffer deprivation.
“The PDP has been further made aware of how part of the fund will be moved to private company accounts as well as various hidden locations for the compromised INEC officials and APC leaders,” the statement said.
the statement said these revelations show clearly that the Buhari administration and the APC does not take the welfare of Nigerians seriously and have completely sold themselves to sleaze and corruption for selfish gains.
“The PDP therefore charges the people of Osun State, particularly the workers to rise up and reject this direct assault on their rights, sensibilities and survival as a people, by the APC, which have become notorious for corruption and subversion of rules. Moreover, the PDP has been at alert regarding the movement of these funds and other secret deals between the APC and INEC and will not hesitate to expose the INEC officials, including a close relation of the President, who has been the arrow head of plots to rig elections for the APC.
“The PDP invites the world to note how President Buhari and the APC, who were huge beneficiaries of credible elections conducted by the PDP in 2015, are bent at destroying our hard-earned democracy, just because they have been rejected by Nigerians,” the party said.
The statement noted that despite the alleged machinations, the PDP is unshaken in its resolve to contend with the APC, “head to head, in all ramifications and magnitude, to discomfit and dismantle its rigging machinery, beginning with September 22, 2018 Osun state governorship election”.
“The PDP commends state governors, particularly a few in the APC, who have spoken out against this sneaky act by the Buhari Presidency. Our party will continue to work with these patriotic individuals in the overall quest to free our nation from the shackles and misrule of the Buhari-led APC,” the statement said.
