TheCable

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) says the Buhari administration is using its members as scapegoats.

In a statement on Wednesday, Dayo Adeyeye, spokesman of the opposition party, alleged that there is a plot to incarcerate 50 of its members before the end of the year.

Adeyeye said the arrests were meant to deceive Nigerians that the “failed anti-corruption war” is still on course.

He said already, five members the party have been illegally arrested and detained by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) without any charge preferred against them.

“We wish to state clearly that what is ongoing under the Buhari administration is not a fight against corruption but an attempt at using members of the PDP as scapegoats and cover up for the ineffectual anti-corruption agenda of the current government,” the statement.

“The current wave of arrests, therefore, has nothing to do with the failed anti-corruption war but everything with 2019 elections. Having failed on all it’s major election planks and with nothing to show for its over thirty months in office, the APC government has come to the conclusion that the only way to prevent its inevitable defeat at the polls in 2019 is to hound, harass, intimidate and suppress members of our party into submission.”

Adeyeye said the PDP would remain “irrepressible and will not bow to any tyranny.”

“The APC has already thrown away its chances in the 2019 elections by its non-performance. No amount of intimidation and harassment of the opposition will improve its fortunes,” he said.

“We call on all men and women of goodwill to rise up to challenge the invidious attempt of the APC government to turn Nigeria into a gestapo state and undermine our hard earned democracy on the altar of political desperation.”