By Akubulu Ngozi
Following the controversies on the 2023 Presidential Election in Nigeria and the declaration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the All Progressive Congress, APC, as the winner of the poll, Former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, SGF, Babachir Lawal, has alleged that, Peter Obi of the Labour Party, LP, won the election not Tinubu.
Lawal alleged this in Abuja lately during an interractive session with news men where he claimed that the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC declaration of Tinubu as the winner of the poll was untrue.
According to him, information gathered from reliable independent sources indicate that, Peter Obi won the majority vote while Tinubu won a less significant vote count.
He said, “I have resisted the temptation to engage in the contemporary political discourse since the May, 2023 election faux pas.
” I did this for two reasons; the first being that as an active player in the drama, I needed time to analyze and digest the data that led to the outcome(s) so I could arrive at an informed decision; the second, being that the rainy season had just set in and it was necessary that I focused my attention on my farms which are the mainstay of my livelihood.
“The current topical issues for political discourse and inquiry are whether or not Bola Tinubu won the presidential election and/or that he was apriori, qualified to participate in the election given his murky bio data as is now being publicly unveiled daily in an avalanche.
“My answer to the first inquiry is that regardless of whatever INEC or Appeal Court said or did, Bola did not win the election.
“Right from the start of the campaigns, Bola knew he was not going to win the election in a free and fair contest so he decide to go by all means.
“Available factual data as aggregated from several independent sources indicate that Obi got the majority votes while Atiku came second. Bola came a distant third in the number of votes scored.
“My answer to the second inquiry is that given the now unfolding deluge of uncomplimentary information about who or what he actually is, ordinarily, sound ethics and morality should have convinced him to voluntarily excuse himself from participation in the election.”