Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has said it would not succumb to blackmail over its call on President Muhammadu Buhari to address the fuel crisis plaguing the country.
It spoke in reaction to a statement by the Presidency, accusing it of plotting to do destabilise the country.
On Monday, the PDP had warned that Nigeria’s situation was getting to a tipping point and could trigger a nationwide agitation that might be worse than the October 2020 #EndSARS protest.
In a statement on Tuesday, Femi Adesina, presidential spokesman, said the PDP was seeking to destabilise Nigeria by threatening the country with comments that promote anarchy, social upheaval and disorderliness. He noted that #EndSARS signifies murder, mayhem mass destruction and cannibalism.
But the opposition party, in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Debo Ologunagba, accused the Presidency and the APC of running from their shadows and haunted by their failures in governance.
It said the Presidency’s reaction to its stance on the fuel crisis was an indication that the Federal Government did not care about the plight of the people. The opposition party said it would not be deterred from fighting for the well being of Nigerians.
“If there is anybody seeking to destabilise our nation, it is the sinking, confused and discomfited APC that is clutching to straws and making unguarded statements including boasting that ‘heavens will not fall’ over its refusal to address the lingering fuel crisis.
“The APC administration is afraid because its corruption, impunity and recklessness which are responsible for the biting petrol and diesel crisis, collapsed national grid, distressed aviation sector, plummeting currency and near collapse of the production and service sectors of the economy are being exposed by the PDP.
“APC is afraid of Nigerians for bungling the once-thriving $550 billion economies (largest in Africa and 26th globally) handed over to it by the PDP in 2015 and reducing our nation to the poverty capital of the world where over 80 million citizens, according to official reports, can no longer afford their daily meals and other basic necessities of life.
“Why would the APC not be afraid of the people when it opened our nation to terrorists and bandits who it reportedly imported from neighbouring countries in 2015 to help APC muscle and rig the elections, after which APC leaders failed to honour their deal to pay the said mercenaries for the heinous ‘services’ they were contracted to provide against Nigerians by the APC?
“The APC is uncomfortable, having been indicted for human rights violations including reported cases of extra-judicial killings, torture, illegal arrests, detentions and other atrocious acts as contained in the June 2021 report of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC).”
