Convention: PDP dismisses APC’s vote-buying allegation

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has dispelled allegations by the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) that the national convention held in Port Harcourt, Rivers state at the weekend was characterised by vote buying.

The PDP said the allegation was an indication that the APC is jittery and panicking over the emergence of former Vice President Atiku Abubakar as the PDP’s presidential candidate.

“Such nervousness in the deflated party has led to a renewed attempt at smear campaign with spurious allegations against our presidential candidate; a defeatist approach that shows that the APC and the Buhari Presidency are afraid of the Atiku candidacy and have reached their wits end, well ahead of the elections.

“The claims by APC, of vote-buying at our national convention, is therefore, not only false but completely unfounded and symptomatic of a party that has totally lost bearing and now engaged in rumour mongering.

“However, for us as a party, such allegation from the APC is not unexpected given that it had tried everything possible to scuttle our national convention and Presidential primary but woefully failed, hence the desperation to engage in attempt to discredit the process that has been acclaimed as the beat in our political history.

“Unlike the APC that has an unpopular presidential candidate, who has failed in governance, foisted on it without an election, the whole world watched with excitement as 12 aspirants contested the PDP presidential primary, where delegates drawn from respected Nigerians across the country, freely voted for a candidate of their choice.

“To the amusement of Nigerians, the APC conducted a non-contested convention in which it declared President Buhari as ‘winner’ with over 14 million fictitious votes.

“While we note that the APC is suffering from a pre-defeat trauma, we caution this fading party and its presidential candidate, who had failed our nation, to steer clear of our party and get ready for issue-based campaign ahead of the 2019 elections,” the PDP said.