By Olusegun Lawrence The PDP Campaign Organisation has unfolded what it will be doing in synergy with the party from now till March 28, when the rescheduled presidential election will hold.
The election was earlier billed for February 14, before the electoral body, INEC bowed to pressure from Security Chiefs to shift the polls.
Addressing a press conference in Abuja on Sunday, the Director of Media and Publicity, Femi Fani-Kayode, said the campaign organization will remain focused on issues and continue to sell its candidate in every nooks and crannies of Nigeria, saying they are confident on winning the election.
He also said the organization will intensify efforts in exposing the weaknesses and violent nature of the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Gen Muhammadu Buhari, ahead of the rescheduled poll.
His words, “In the light of the shift in election dates, the PDP Presidential Campaign Organization, acting in concert and synergy with the PDP, will intensify our campaign in every nook and cranny of this country to sell President Goodluck Jonathan to the electorate and Nigerians in general as the best candidate who should be voted for and elected as president in the March 28 presidential election.
“The campaign will be all-encompassing and robust and it will reach all levels in order to shore up the chances of our various candidates in the elections.
“We will remain sharply focused on our campaign issues. We will continue to sell the candidates of President Jonathan whose victory at the poll is key to everything we stand.
“We will continue to expose the chicanery, the weaknesses and the violent nature of the opposition APC and its presidential candidate, General Muhammadu Buhari.
“In our swift response yesterday (Saturday) , we condemned the opposition APC for its paranoid delusions and its far-fetched and childish conspiracy theories on the issue of poll shift. We said that by insisting that the elections should be conducted on February 14th, the opposition was not only dangerously flirting with chaos but was also putting our country firmly on the path of confrontation, division, injustice, disaster and destruction.
“We posited that a situation where no less than 34 percent of our people would have been disenfranchised is unacceptable and the fact that the APC was insensitive to that fact speaks volumes.
“All stakeholders in the forthcoming elections should therefore take advantage of this short extension to get their acts together and prepare for the elections.
“This is all the more so because there will be no room for a further shift of poll date within the ambit of the relevant extant laws”.
The Campaign Organisation commended INEC’s courage in shifting the polls, charging it to ensure 100 percent or less distribution of Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) to all registered voters.
“On our part, we will increase advocacy and sensitisation on the PVC collection because we are not comfortable with the fact that as at the time INEC announced the shift in election dates, 34 percent of eligible voters have not been able to access their Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs).
“Our Campaign Organisation will be ready to collaborate with the APC Presidential Campaign Organisation to support the process of PVCs collection so that no part of the country is seen to have been deliberately manipulated into a position of disadvantage through low percentage rate of PVCs distribution and collection whilst the other part of the country has recorded between 80 and 98 percent collection.
“The credibility, acceptability and success of the forthcoming elections are therefore dependent on two things: firstly 100 percent or just below 100 percent distribution of the PVCs to eligible registered voters so that no-one or no group of people are disenfranchised and secondly the deployment of adequate security forces before, during and after the elections who will ensure that the electorate are able to go out to perform their civic responsibility of voting on the election days.
“These are our legitimate and genuine concerns.”
Fani-Kayode thanked the party’s supporters, adding we wish to encourage them to remain calm and patient.
