The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has told President Muhammadu Buhari that he has no option in 2023 than to leave office at the end of his tenure.
Buhari had, in his New Year message to Nigerians, said that he would stand down in 2023, promising not to contest election again.
This was the second time in two months Buhari was dispelling his rumoured plan for a third term in office.
Lagos lawyer, Femi Falana (SAN), had earlier raised the alarm that President Buhari was nursing a third term agenda.
Falana had noted: “You may have a third term campaign very soon. Very soon, they are going to destroy all possible opponents and they have started.
“So, by the time they bring in the third term agenda, the media would have been gone, but we are not going to allow it.”
But the president told members of the All Progressives Congress (APC) National Executive Committee (NEC) last November that he would not seek an extension of office when his tenure elapsed in 2023.
“I am not going to make the mistake of attempting a third term or whatever term. Besides age, I swore by the Holy Book I believe in that I will go by the constitution and the constitution says two terms,” Buhari stated.
Before the president’s declaration, a member of APC in Ebonyi State, Charles Enya, filed a suit in court seeking the amendment of the constitution to allow President Buhari another term in office.
In the suit he filed before a Federal High Court, Enya argued that the two-term tenure limit for president and governors is “discriminatory.”
According to him, “That section 137(1)(b) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria,1999 (as amended) restricting the president to only two terms of four years each, is inoperative by virtue of its discriminatory nature in relation to the executive and legislative branches of government in Nigeria, and therefore null and void and thus inapplicable.”
He was seeking an “order of the court nullifying and setting aside section 137(1)(b) and 182(1) (b) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (as amended). And directing the first and second defendants to delete and expunge sections 137(1)(b) and 182(1)(b) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, (as amended).”
Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN), Clerk of the National Assembly, Mohammed Sani-Omolori and the National Assembly, were defendants to the suit, which was later withdrawn following public outcry.
President Buhari, however, in his New Year message, which was released yesterday said: “I understand very well the frustrations our system has in the past triggered. I will be standing down in 2023 and will not be available in any future elections.
“But I am determined to help strengthen the electoral process both in Nigeria and across the region, where several ECOWAS members go to the polls this year.”
But, the main opposition party, the PDP, said such promise is unnecessary, advising that he should stop presenting a picture as if he has the option to continue in office beyond 2023.
The party, in a statement yesterday by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, described President Buhari’s New Year message as “uninspiring, tasteless, repetitive, vacuous and does not galvanize any form of hope for a despairing nation like ours.”
PDP said President Buhari should issue a fresh New Year message to show remorse for the corruption, incompetence and misrule of his administration.
It equally warned the president’s party, the APC, against what it called crass insincerity, violence and divisive machinations that have brought so much pain, anguish and despondency to Nigerians.
According to the PDP, President Buhari’s tenure ends in 2023, in accordance to the letter and spirit of the 1999 Constitution (as amended), arguing that issue of “standing down” or not being “available” for future election does not arise.
PDP said: “Indeed, President Buhari should stop presenting a picture as if he has the option to continue in office beyond 2023.
“The PDP holds, in total submission to the letter and spirit of the 1999 Constitution (as amended), that it is not an issue of “standing down” or not being “available” for future election, but a decided and inevitable position as contained in our constitution that he must quit office after two terms which will end in 2023.
“Mr. President, therefore, does not have any other choice before the law.
“Whether President Buhari likes it or not, he and his APC will exit the arena at the end of this tenure. History is replete with lessons from those who sought to stretch our nation beyond her limits.
“Moreover, President Buhari and his extinguishing APC ought to have known by now that Nigerians have moved ahead and cannot wait to see them go.
“The citizens are no longer swayed by empty promises and false performance indices as replete in Mr. President’s New Year message.
“Our party restates that President Buhari should, therefore, end this showboating by issuing a fresh New Year message to demonstrate a commitment to electoral reforms by returning the 8th Assembly Electoral Act amendment bill, which he refused to sign, to the National Assembly without any further delay.
“He should also be prepared to waste no time in signing the bill into law when retooled to meet current exigencies and passed by the current National Assembly.”
The party also called on President Buhari to order the immediate prosecution of his party leaders who allegedly perpetrated violence in the 2019 general election as well as the governorship elections in Ekiti, Osun, Bayelsa and Kogi states.
“Mr. President should apologise for the violation of human rights, attacks on institutions of democracy, disobedience to court orders and constitutional violations under his administration as well as order an immediate investigation and prosecution of all those who played roles in these ugly episodes,” the statement added.
It said President Buhari should apologise for his administration’s failure to secure the nation and for plunging it into a biting economic recession.
The party regretted that the administration’s alleged incompetence, corruption and unbridled treasury looting led to the degrading of Nigeria from one of the world’s fastest growing economies to world’s poverty capital.
“Such course of humility in showing remorse, seeking help and getting competent hands to manage our economy and security system should be the legacy which Mr. President is expected to pursue without which history cannot be kind to his administration and his APC,” PDP added.
However, Chairman of Buhari Media Organisation (BMO), Niyi Akinsuji, has stated that President Buhari never nursed any intention to extend his tenure beyond the constitutionally-mandated two terms.
BMO, one of the support groups of the President, said Buhari would not join the PDP “in their hall of shame in this regard.”
“The PDP is simply obfuscating issues. If Nigerians had become sensitive to political leadership attempting to profane the letters of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in matters relating to presidential tenure elongation, it was because different presidents in the 16 years of PDP misrule, had, through subterranean manoeuvres and mischievous subterfuge, attempted to steal power away from the people.
“Their response to President Buhari’s unlimited and unconditional public declaration of not nursing an ambition to stay a day longer in office once his term expires is a comical face saving machination by the PDP to distract public attention from the integrity and credibility inherent in President Buhari’s dismissal of the tenure elongation rumours made popular by PDP malicious fake news amplification machinery.
“Their party still holds the records of gluttonous attachment to naked power to state their base desires for material acquisition, President Buhari never nursed any intention to join them in their hall of shame in this regard.”
