Opposition parties have criticized the presidential candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress, Bola Tinubu, for his statement that recent developments in Nigeria were directed at frustrating his bid.
Tinubu had said the current petrol scarcity and the redesign of the naira were strategies of “saboteurs” to derail the 2023 General Election and cause him to lose the presidential vote.
He, however, boasted that he would win when he campaigned in the Ogun State capital, Abeokuta on Thursday.
“Hide the petrol, hide the naira, we will still vote! We will win!
“Even if you change the ink on naira notes, what you want will not happen. We will win. That umbrella party (PDP) will lose.
“We will take this government from them; saboteurs that are dragging power with us,” he said at the APC presidential campaign rally.
“They don’t want the election to hold. They want to disrupt it,” he added.
You Can't Exonerate Yourself –PDP
But the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) swiftly accused Tinubu of being a supporter of the Buhari government and his policies.
The party said he was trying to hoodwink Nigerians into thinking he is different from the government.
“It is unfortunate that Tinubu is trying to hoodwink Nigerians by seeking to exonerate himself and blame others in the Buhari led-APC administration for the biting fuel scarcity in the country when in reality he (Tinubu) is known to be behind the insensitive and anti-people policies that have brought so much calamity to our country including the current persistent fuel scarcity,” the PDP’s spokesman, Kola Ologbondiyan, said in a statement.
“How can Asiwaju Tinubu accuse an administration he had been a part of since 2015 of trying to sabotage the 2023 elections except he is making revelations to Nigerians about their plans?
“It is imperative to state that Nigerians, who are prepared to trek distances to cast their votes are the patriots who have been at the butt of pains which the government Asiwaju Tinubu installed has foisted on them.”
Stop Going to Abeokuta –Labour Party
The Labour Party (LP) presidential campaign also took a swipe at Tinubu, asking him to stop going to Abeokuta.
“If I were to be Tinubu’s adviser, I would have advised him to stop going to Abeokuta. It was in the same Abeokuta that he made the gaffe of ‘Olule’ and how President Muhammadu Buhari was crying on TV, ’emi lokan’ and all that,” the spokesman of the Obi-Datti Presidential Campaign Council, Diran Onifade, said.
“Now, he (Tinubu) is saying the fuel scarcity is meant to make the elections fail and how they are going to take over power from them. Who are they or them?” he asked.
“He could have been talking to the CBN governor (Godwin Emefiele) and the Minister of Petroleum and who is the minister of petroleum in this respect, President Muhammadu Buhari.
“The same man that Tinubu has been campaigning that he wants to take over from and continue the good work.”
Tinubu, the PDP’s Atiku Abubakar, and the LP’s Peter Obi are the leading candidates in the race for Aso Rock Villa in what is projected to be a close race.
