Press Statement
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) criticizes the President Muhammadu
Buhari’s Presidency for allowing the Chairman of the Presidential
Advisory Committee Against Corruption, Prof Itse Sagay to cast
aspersions on the integrity of the Justices of the Supreme Court over
the Court’s widely accepted judgment on Rivers and Zamfara states
elections.
The party holds that Prof. Sagay’s resort to incitement and hate
language against the Supreme Court justices further exposes the
desperation of the Buhari Presidency and the All Progressives congress
(APC) to cow, blackmail, intimidate and attempt to annex the judiciary,
particularly, the Supreme Court, ahead of the determination of PDP’s
Presidential election petition, now before the Court of Appeal.
The PDP notes that Prof. Sagay’s comment has also revealed the level of
condescension, derision and contempt the Buhari Presidency and the APC
have for the Justices of the Supreme Court.
By declaring the upholding of justice by the Supreme Court as a
“national tragedy” and “unimaginable injustice”, and suggesting that,
“we (probably, his party members) should not allow” the judgment as
delivered, Prof. Sagay is calling for anarchy and rebelliousness against
our constitutional democratic order and rule of law.
Our party believes that such intentional attack on the integrity of the
Supreme Court can only emanate from feverish apprehensions by the Buhari
Presidency and the APC that they might not have their way in the
Presidential election petition, hence this resort to blackmail.
As a law-abiding party, the PDP holds the integrity of the justices as
well as the institution of the judiciary very high and do not support
this attempt by agents of the APC to clip and sequester the judiciary
for their partisan interests.
The PDP insists that there is no way Prof. Sagay, a professor of Law,
can justify his call for the rejection of the Supreme Court judgment on
Zamfara and Rivers states, as the judgments are in protection of rule
of law, democratic ethos as well as the wishes and aspirations of the
people over the attempt by the APC to take control of their states
through manipulations and awarding of fictitious votes to their
candidates.
The PDP therefore calls on the Supreme Court Justices to note the
machinations of the APC and continue to be firm in upholding justice as
has been demonstrated in the judgments on Rivers and Zamfara states
elections, which serve as lessons to political parties to adhere
strictly to rules of internal democracy in our electoral processes.
Signed:
Kola Ologbondiyan
National Publicity Secretary
