Apologise to Nigerians for Distracting Buhari, Lai Mohammed Tells PDP, Atiku

• Lai Mohamed describes petition as frivolous.
• Says PDP, Atiku should be thanking their stars that they are not being prosecuted for presenting a fraudulently-obtained evidence.

The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, has asked the opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its presidential candidate in the last elections, Atiku Abubakar to apologize to Nigerians for distracting the Buhari Administration with a ‘frivolous election petition’, instead of appealing the ruling of Wednesday’s Presidential Election Petition Tribunal.

The PDP had expressed its shock over the judgment and said it is proceeding to the Supreme Court.

Mohammed in a statement issued in St Petersburg, Russian Federation, on Thursday, he said while the PDP and its candidate reserve the right to pursue their petition to the highest level as they will be better served by “dropping their toga of desperation and realizing that there is a limit to tomfoolery.

READ: Wike Commended for Congratulating Buhari Over Tribunal Judgement

The minister who further said Nigerians are tired of the orchestrated distraction, and will rather wish that the opposition, having lost at the polls and in court, will now join hands with the government to move Nigeria to the next level.

”This is more so that the judgement validating the re-election of President Muhammadu Buhari was unanimous that the petition lacked merit, that the petitioners failed to prove any of the grounds upon which their case was anchored and that President Buhari is eminently qualified to contest the poll,” he said.

He further advised the party and Atiku that instead of casting aspersion on the judiciary with their poorly-framed reaction to the ruling of the Tribunal, they should be thanking their stars that they are not being prosecuted for coming to court with fraudulently-obtained evidence.

READ: 2019 Poll: Tribunal Dismisses Atiku’s Petition Challenging Buhari’s Re-election

”It is intriguing that a party that trumpets the rule of law at every turn will present, in open court, evidence it claimed to have obtained by hacking into a supposed INEC server. Don’t they realize this is a criminal act for which they are liable? Instead of threatening to head to the Supreme Court, driven more by ego than commonsense, they should be sorry for allowing desperation to overwhelm their sense of reasoning. Enough is enough,” he said.

Commending the Tribunal for not only doing justice to the case but for explaining in painstaking details that lasted hours, how it arrived at its judgment, Mohamed also thanked Nigerians, who voted massively to re-elect President Buhari, for their continued support.