ALL Progressives Congress’ (APC) presidential aspirants, Maj. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari and Alhaji Atiku Abubakar as well as the party’s chieftain, Chief Audu Ogbeh, have condemned the police invasion of the National Assembly.
Buhari said: “If it is true that the House of Representatives has been attacked and the Speaker shot at, then those who are supposed to be protecting the constitution are subverting it. God help us.”
Former Vice President Atiku said “the siege mentality of President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration poses grave danger to the nation’s democracy.”
He condemned what he called “the crude method” being used by the Jonathan administration to harass and humiliate perceived political enemies into submission.
Atiku said the action would not augur well for the nation’s democracy.
A statement from his media office in Abuja noted that considering the fact that the rule of law and the separation of power were enshrined in the constitution, invading the National Assembly amount to trampling on the duties of the legislature.
He explained that with emergency rule failing to stem the unrest in the Northeast, the Federal Government must work with, rather than against those who understand and have been elected by the people to govern.
He said the behaviour of the PDP-led government towards Tambuwal was not decent and acceptable under a president that has committed himself to uphold the rule of law, adding that the “crisis highlights the absolute failure of the current PDP’s idea of government: arrogant, indifferent and incompetent.”
He stressed that abuse of power by using state agents to harass, intimidate and humiliate perceived opponents was not only capable of heating the polity on frightening scale, but also carried the risks of polarising and politicising security operatives in the country.
“What is happening at the National Assembly taken together with what unfolded today (yesterday) at the Ekiti House of Assembly is totally strange. It is not the democracy we fought for; for which many of our compatriots paid for with their lives. These free-riders should not be allowed to destroy what others built with their sweat and blood,” Atiku said.
Ogbeh, in his reaction, said: “That is lawlessness, where the police begin to interpret the constitution and bully a democratic institution. It is the beginning of anarchy.”
Ogbeh suggested that President Goodluck Jonathan should push for the passage of an insurgency act, instead of seeking for an extension of emergency rule.
He explained that with such an act in place, vigilantes and hunters working with the military would be legally backed to join in the fight.
