The ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) says the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) laid the foundation for the challenges bewildering the country during its 16 years in power.

The APC said the PDP presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, should not be canvassing for votes ahead of the 2023 general election, describing the PDP as a “party of looters”.

The ruling party equally lashed out at Atiku, a former Vice President, over his statement expressing surprise at the existence of Boko Haram insurgents, saying the opposition party nurtured the conditions that led to the emergence of the terrorists in the country.

Atiku, while speaking at the ‘People’s Townhall’ series for presidential candidates and their running mates, organised by Channels Television last Sunday, said he could not understand the Boko Haram phenomenon and wondered why the terrorists continued to operate in the country.

Reacting via a statement issued on Saturday by the Director, Media and Publicity, APC Presidential Campaign Council, Bayo Onanuga, the party said the PDP was clueless about how to deal with the Boko Haram insurgency while cities and people were bombed and maimed by the terrorists.

The APC further accused the opposition of depleting the country’s foreign reserves to $28 billion in May 2015, adding that the party, “now posing as recovery agents” made Nigeria’s economy bad before President Muhammadu Buhari took over on May 29, 2015.

It said: “Leaders of Peoples Democratic Party and its presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, are playing on our seeming forgetfulness and insulting our collective intelligence.

“Having consistently shown lack of capacity for introspection, PDP Leaders have been going about the country slandering the All Progressives Congress-led government of President Muhammadu Buhari, believing that as Nigerians we have forgotten their atrocious era and that we are unappreciative ignoramuses.

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“Notably Atiku Abubakar, the presidential candidate of the party that once contemplated changing its brand name because of its atrocious record, has been emboldened by our assumed forgetfulness as a nation, mounting podiums and trying to deodorise and beautify the party’s ugly era.

“Alhaji Atiku blamed the APC for the emergence of Boko Haram, forgetting that the insurgents emerged in 2009 under his party’s watch. He blamed Buhari over the economic challenges, forgetting that he opportunistically joined the coalition that toppled the clueless PDP government of President Jonathan when the economy was nose-diving.

“Atiku has now been joined by Abubakar Saraki, the failed Senate President and saboteur-in-chief of the Buhari agenda, who in his latest comment in Ilorin, urged Nigerians to ‘go back to the PDP at both the state and the national levels’. In the famous words of Dino Melaye, we say ‘PDP: God forbid ‘.

“The truth be told, PDP in a sane society should not be canvassing for votes to be returned to office when during their 16 years in power, they laid the foundation for the challenges we face today.

“Let us not forget what the party of looters did to our treasury, depleting foreign reserves to $28 billion by May 2015, even though a record N75 trillion flowed into the treasury from oil sales alone, with almost nothing to show.

“Let us not forget that the party of looters nurtured the conditions that led to the emergence of Boko Haram on our soil and it was so clueless about how to deal with the menace as our cities and people were bombed and maimed by Boko Haram terrorists.

“Let us not forget that for six years, the PDP allowed the insurgents to declare a Caliphate on our soil, controlling 17 local governments in Borno State and four in Adamawa, making Atiku unable to go to Jada, his hometown.

“Let us not forget that the PDP left our infrastructure decrepit, highways impassable after allotted money to contractors had been shared by party stalwarts.

“Let us not forget that this party now posing as recovery agents had already grounded our country and made our economy comatose before Buhari took over on 29 May 2015,” the APC stated.

The ruling party noted that the two poorest states in Nigeria, Sokoto and Bayelsa states, are states being governed by the PDP in the last 8 years, adding that Buhari’s administration, in the past seven and half years, has been trying to ”clear the mess left by the PDP predecessors”.

“Despite the challenges faced on the economic front, among which is dwindling revenue exacerbated by oil theft, the government has been able to showcase many game-changing projects.

“One of them which temporarily opened on 15 December, is the Second Niger Bridge. The PDP promised the South East states and Ifeanyi Okowa’s Delta State that it would do the bridge. For 16 years, the party made one empty promise after another. Muhammadu Buhari in 2018 decided to take on the project. He awarded it all over again and in record time the 1.6 kilometres long bridge is ready. And it comes with other ancillary infrastructure including a 10.3 km highway, a bypass to Owerri, and a toll station at Obosi.

“While we promise Nigerians that our presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, will build on Buhari’s legacy and improve the economy and the security situation, we can only say to the PDP: ‘Nigerians have rejected you and our people will not buy your lies again!’” the APC stated.

The Star