The Democratic Alternative Party (DA) has asked Nigerians to rise up against Senator Bola Tinubu’s inauguration only 16 days before it is scheduled to take place, claiming that the election process was marked by much fraud and irregularities.
Victor Vishnay, the DA-Democratic Alternative Party’s presidential candidate, made the request at a news conference in Abuja yesterday. He urged President Muhammadu Buhari to put off the 2023 elections since they did not adhere to accepted international norms.
Because of corruption, “I enjoin Nigerians to call on the president to cancel the 2023 general election, especially the presidential election.”
We need genuine change, and the struggle for a better Nigeria must begin with the annulment of the election. It wasn’t impartial or free.
He said that Buhari “single-handedly influenced the outcome of the February 25, presidential election” by exposing his ballot paper quickly after casting his ballot and therefore demonstrating that he voted for Tinubu.
The president must thus call off the election; he should provide justification for doing so and resign. The Vice President may assume power or he may form a committee to run the nation after his departure.
The presidential contender demanded that Prof. Mahmoud Yakubu, the INEC Chairman, be investigated and then charged with “sabotage” in addition to calling for the annulment of the election.
He said that Nigerians must start responding and guarantee that individuals are penalized for their claimed shortcomings or offenses and pointed out that Yakubu had no justification for failing at all.
Earlier, Prince Frank Ukonga, the party’s national chairman, vowed to sue the electoral umpire for failing to include the party in the 2023 elections.
He said that the DA-Democratic Alternative Party was one of 74 political parties that INEC had deregistered in 2020 but that the Court of Appeal, Abuja, subsequently reinstated.
“DA applied to participate in the February 23, 2022, Enugu State Local Government Election basing on this legal window in favor of DA to be relisted by INEC. ENSIEC granted DA the opportunity to participate in the election by obeying the court judgment of suit FHC/ABJ/ CS/456/2021 in favor of DA and 2 others,” Ukonga said.
However, he pointed out that INEC refused to accept them as candidates for the 2023 elections despite “our letter of March 3, 2023, expressing our dissatisfaction in the exclusion of DA presidential candidate, Mr. Victor Vishnay; vice presidential candidate, Mrs. Hafsatu Abubakar and other candidates and DA logo from the 2023 general election.”
The national chairman urged INEC to comply with the Supreme Court’s ruling in INEC v. Youth Party and reinstate the 74 political parties that had been forcibly deregistered in order to promote multiparty democracy in Nigeria.