Two-term former national ex-officio of the governing All Progressives Congress (APC) in the country, Chief Nduka Anyanwu, has called on the opposition to accept the olive branch being extended to them by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu in Nigeria’s interest.
He made the call while baring his mind on the apex court’s judgement which revalidated the victory of President Tinubu at Nigeria’s 2023 presidential election conducted by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
On Thursday, the Supreme Court of Nigeria had quashed petitions filed before it by presidential candidates of the Labour Party (LP) Peter Obi, and Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
Obi and Atiku in separate suits had approached the apex court to appeal the judgement of the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal that had earlier upheld Tinubu’s victory at the poll.
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Recall that Tinubu, the APC standard-bearer, emerged as President-elect of Nigeria after polling a total of 8,794,726 votes to beat Mr Atiku Abubakar who scored a total number of 6,984,520 votes cast to come second; while the candidate of the LP polled a total of 6, 101,533 votes cast to take the third place.
Anyanwu congratulated President Tinubu on the reaffirmation of the people’s mandate entrusted to him, calling on Atiku and Obi to accept the olive branch extended to them by the new Nigerian leader in the interest of peace in the country.
Anyanwu also urged the two Nigerian leaders to jettison political bickering and work together with President Tinubu in raising the bar of governance in Nigeria through the ongoing implementation of visionary and development-oriented policies tilted toward improving people’s livelihoods.
He said: “Now all the litigations against the recent outcomes of the conducted Nigeria 2023 presidential elections have been decided by the Supreme Court of Nigeria in favour of the APC, the President should not be distracted, rather, we should collectively rally around him. And we should continue in giving the President support to be able to address the challenges facing the nation”.
Anyanwu further stressed that now that the lingering issues which emanated over recent outcomes of the last presidential elections have been resolved, every citizen irrespective of ethnic, political and religious leanings should work towards the peace, unity and progress of Nigeria.
