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Tag: Nigeria Decides 2023

  • #NigeriaDecides2023: We have agents to monitor polls – Labour Party

    #NigeriaDecides2023: We have agents to monitor polls – Labour Party

    Contrary to recent reports, the Labour Party has made disclosure of having agents and volunteers to monitor the 2023 general election.

    TheNewsGuru.com (TNG) reports Dr Yunusa Tanko, Spokesman of the Labour Party presidential campaign council, made the disclosure in a statement on Sunday.

    Recall reports have circulated recently that the Labour Party does not have polling agents in core Northern states to monitor the polls.

    However, Dr Tanko disclosed that agents of the party are solidly on ground championing the ways and means to change the narrative in the 2023 general election.

    “We have volunteers all over the country that surpass even the number of agents required for each Polling booth so the issue of not being able to supply agents for 90,000 units is a complete fallacy designed by the enemies of progress in Nigeria,” Tanko stated.

    He also revealed in the statement that his party has a task force on the recruitment and selection of agents headed by Peter Obi himself, who is the presidential candidate of the party.

    The statement reads in full: “The attention of the Labour Party Presidential campaign council, (LP PCC) has been drawn to yet another deceitful information circulating in the social media to the effect that our party has not submitted agents for 90,000 Polling Units in North Central, Northeast and Northwest.

    “We see this as yet another propaganda from the opposition to bring our rising influence down and deceive the electorate in an election year.

    “We have volunteers all over the country that surpass even the number of agents required for each Polling booth so the issue of not being able to supply agents for 90,000 units is a complete fallacy designed by the enemies of progress in Nigeria.

    “INEC gave a window of up to January 20th for political parties to submit their list of agents for the elections and as such cannot at this time raise concerns about any political Party not being able to submit enough agents.

    “The Labour Party has a task force on the recruitment and selection of agents headed by our presidential candidate H.E. Peter Obi himself and his Vice, Datti, the National Chairman and the National Secretary of the party are all members of that committee.

    “LPPCC is investigating the source of this propaganda because we know it is not definitely from the INEC.

    “We appeal to the Obidient family and the teeming supporters of our party to disregard the deceitful information and focus on the collection of their PVCs which are our collective weapons to dislodge the enemies of our dear country”.

  • 2023 elections: Nigerians will not accept a rigged election – Cardinal Onaiyekan warns

    2023 elections: Nigerians will not accept a rigged election – Cardinal Onaiyekan warns

    His Grace, Cardinal John Onaiyekan, Catholic Archbishop Emeritus of Abuja has warned that Nigerians will not accept it quietly if the 2023 presidential election is rigged.

    TheNewsGuru.com (TNG) reports Cardinal Onaiyekan gave the warning on Saturday during the celebration of his 40th anniversary as Bishop, at the Holy Trinity Church, Maitama, Abuja.

    Archbishop Emeritus Onaiyekan gave the warning while cautioning politicians that the 2023 presidential election will not be business as usual.

    “With the current yearnings of the people for a better country, the election will no longer be business as usual. As regards to the results of the elections, politicians should desist from any form of manipulations to their favour if not voted for.

    “All those who are planing to play games and scheme to rig in order to frustrate the desire of the decision of the people as regards the results of the elections, should desists from such.

    “All of them whether they are in government or not; they should desist from rigging or causing violence, they should not do it, they should allow this election to run in a free and fair way,” Onaiyekan noted.

    He assured that he has no special candidate, adding that the advice was for the politicians to understand that “the mood in which Nigeria now is, is not a mood that they will quietly accept a rigged election.

    “For the sake of peace, there will be serious repercussions if anybody doesn’t allow a free and fair elections. It won’t be business as usual, anymore.

    “I want Nigerians to know that they can no longer keep quiet all the time, hoping that things will change; that God will work miracles.”

    Onaiyekan advised Nigerians to use their voter cards to express their minds.

    According to him, the outcome of the election will no be about who has more campaign posters or can mobilise more crowds to stadiums.

    “It will depend on who can convince Nigerians, and give us a new kind of government.

    “Government that is based on people interested in working for the common good and not out to enrich themselves or stay in power or protect their stolen wealth so as not to be queried,” he said.

    The Archbishop advised politicians to fear God, as they would answer to their actions before Him.

    “Even if no one asks questions, God will ask questions and He has His way of asking questions,” he added.

    Also during the church service, the cardinal narrated his journey through priesthood.

    “on a Thursday afternoon, January  1983, Pope John Paul II ordained  me, Monsignor John Onaiyekan, a Bishop at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome.

    “40 years after as a Bishop, I return thanks to God, many who were with me in that day are no more, but God through His special grace has kept me,” he said.

    He prayed God to bless all who had come and those who couldn’t but have prayed for him.

    In his speech, the Archbishop of Abuja Archdiocese, His Grace Ignatius Kaigama, described the cardinal as a man of humility and peace.

    “So, we celebrate Gods gift to us in Nigeria, Abuja and in the world and i am happy that God has spared him thus far,” Kaigama said.

    Friends and clerics from within and outside Nigeria came out to celebrate the cardinal.

  • Nigeria Decides 2023: Action Alliance threatens protest at NASS over exclusion of its candidates

    Nigeria Decides 2023: Action Alliance threatens protest at NASS over exclusion of its candidates

    Action Alliance (AA) on Saturday, threatened to stage a peaceful protest at the National Assembly over alleged exclusion of its candidates from the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC)’s list for the 2023 general elections.

    The National Chairman of AA, Dr Adekunle Omo-Aje, stated this at a news conference at the party’s national headquarters in Abuja.

    Omo-Aje said that INEC’s alleged failure to upload the names of all the candidates presented to it by his leadership in spite of various court orders against the recognition of the list of candidates submitted by the sacked national chairman of the party, Mr Kenneth Udeze, might jeopardise the forthcoming polls.

    “We shall move to the National Assembly on a protest and, to submit our protest letter and to inform our lawmakers that, if the INEC Chairman, Prof Mahmood Yakubu, is not called to order, there will be negative consequential effects on the outcome of 2023 elections.

    “We shall use all legal channels to ensure we get justice against any form of exclusion from presenting our candidates for elections, and every such election stands the chances of annulment by law,” he said.

    Omo-Aje alleged that “Yakubu is covertly orchestrating a clandestine plan against the 2023 elections, and Action Alliance will not fold our arms and watch our nascent democracy rubbished and wounded.”

    He said that Udeze was the party’s national chairman up to June 2019 before he was suspended and expelled.

    Omo-Aje said he emerged the national chairman after a national elective convention conducted in February 2020 and monitored by INEC officials.

    He said instead of Udeze to challenge his suspension and expulsion from the party internally and through the courts, he instituted several court cases urging the courts to declare him national chairman of the party but lost all.

    According to him, in spite of fulfilling all INEC electoral guidelines and requirements according to the Nigerian constitution with the commission, the electoral umpire is “hell bent on excluding Action Alliance from the coming 2023 general elections.”

    “It has gotten to the level for us in Action Alliance to come out in the open and make categorical statements loud and clear on the rooftop to the hearing of all concerned citizens of this country.

    “This forms the crux of our press briefing, to draw the attention of the relevant authorities and the nation in particular about the miscarriage of justice in INEC, actively promoted by its Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu,” he said.

    He also called on the Nigerian Bar Association to intervene in concertedly sanitising the legal profession by fishing out bad eggs among its membership.

    “There is a clique of lawyers today on our streets that neither cares about the ethics of the bar nor give credence to professionalism.

    “These lawyers sniff around for legal lacuna to exploit, not minding whether such constitute abuse of court processes or not.

    “In the course of our ordeal, we have seen a lot of these tactical unprofessional practices where lawyers are engaged by persons to sue themselves as if they were truly sued in real terms, ” he said.

    At a national congress held by AA in Abuja, Mr Solomon-David Okanigbuan emerged the party’s presidential candidate, among others.

    But retired Major Hamza Al-Mustapha, the former aide to late Gen. Sani Abacha, also won the presidential primary election conducted by the Udeze-led faction on June 9 in Abuja.

    The electoral umpire had recognised all the candidates presented to it by the Udeze-led faction, despite court judgements declaring that Udeze was no longer a member of the party.

    There is also an order directing INEC to accept and publish all the candidates sent to it by the Omo-Aje leadership of the AA.