The Presidential Candidate of the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, Atiku Abubakar, has described the Supreme Court judgement which upheld President Tinubu’s election as Nigeria’s loss.
He said this at a press conference organized by his party in Abuja on Monday, October 30. Atiku explained that the election and court processes afterward were not about him but about Nigeria, its institutions and its future.
He insisted that the then candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Tinubu, was not qualified to contest the February 2023 presidential poll.
According to him, with its judgement, the Supreme Court has simply told Nigerians that it is alright to win an election by any means including “forgery, identity theft, violence.”
He said in part;
Someone asked me what I would do if I lost my election petition appeal at the Supreme Court. In response, I said that as long as Nigeria wins, the struggle would have been worth the while. By that, I meant that the bigger loss would not be mine but Nigeria’s if the Supreme Court legitimizes illegality, including forgery, identity theft, and perjury.If the Supreme Court, the highest court in the land, implies by its judgment that crime is good and should be rewarded, then Nigeria has lost and the country is doomed irrespective of who occupies the Presidential seat. If the Supreme Court decides that the Electoral umpire, INEC, can tell the public one thing and then do something else in order to reach a corruptly predetermined outcome, then there is really no hope for the country’s democracy and electoral politics.
Obviously, the consequences of those decisions for the country will not end at the expiration of the current government. They will last for decades. I am absolutely sure that history will vindicate me. We now know what the Supreme Court has decided.
