The Pan-Yoruba socio-political organisation, Afenifere, has put the attack on the Presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Peter Obi, by Information Minister, Alhaji Lai Mohammed down to ingratiation.
Mohammed is rumoured to be in the bad grace of Bola Ahmed Tinubu, who he worked under as Chief of Staff during the President-Elect’s time as Lagos governor.
Between them a lot has passed, one of which was Tinubu’s support for the Minister’s son, Folarin, to represent Ikeja Constituency 1 in the State House of Assembly twice.
This time around, vain was Folarin’s third attempt as he lost at the All Progressives Congress primary.
The loss of APC ticket, an indication that something has come between Mohammed and his ex-principal, the Kwara-born politician seeming uncharacteristic indifference to Tinubu’s electoral campaign at least openly is also a testimony that both are estranged.
Afenifere in a statement its Secretary General, Sola Ebiseni released, said Mohammed’s recent attack on Obi was called forth by the supposed estrangement, saying the eloquent speaker’s desire is to curry Tinubu’s favour.
The said statement in part, “Lai Mohammed, the Minister of Information, falls in this unenviable class, with his current visits and interviews in the United States of America, to taint sacred facts about the 2023 Presidential election.
“Whereas the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, in the glare of the whole world, had admitted the failures of the statutorily prescribed components of the electoral process.
“It is certainly not true as Lai Mohammed claimed that under our laws today, management of election results is manual”, the ruling of the court “that INEC has the exclusive right to determine the mode of election, its collation and transmission” only compels the Commission to act in tandem with its electoral guidelines to that effect.
“The essence of amending our electoral laws resulting in the Electoral Act 2022 is the surgical removal of the mischief of managing our electoral process by the pernicious manual procedures.
“In a clear case of abuse of office, Lai Mohammed, trying desperately to dance himself back to the mind of his party candidate having taken a different course during the primaries , has mindlessly descended to the abyss of falsehood reminiscent of his modus operandi as party spokesperson with which he has odiously smeared the office of the nation’s Minister of Information.
“The Minister lied when he claimed that “the President ensured that nobody used the security agencies to rig the election in his favour but created a level-playing ground for the election.
“The truth is that the security agencies in many states not only worked for the ruling party, government and its security arms watched in acquiescence as leaders of armed thugs boastfully threatened citizens with mayhem which they freely carried out as if we are in a state of nature.
“Rather than tout the loss of the home states of some of his party’s leaders to the opposition as proof of fair election, Lai Mohammed should have been courageous enough to ascribe the feat to the vigilance of the people and why they incurred the wrath of organised and armed hired thugs in the elections.
“One wonders what is left for the courts to decide after the crude analysis by Lai Mohammed of the performance of the candidates, the figures of which he effortlessly and shamelessly bacterized.
“He ruled that Obi and Atiku failed to meet the constitutional requirements to be declared president.
“He crudely handed down judgment on the status of the FCT and lied against the constitution when he said “not only must a candidate have the plurality of votes, he must also have scored one-quarter of votes cast in at least 25 states.”
