Otunba Gani Adams, the National Coordinator of the Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC), said that Nigerians were blindfolded with garbage propaganda during the 2015 election campaigns in order to vote for Buhari against Jonathan.
Adams stated this while responding to an interview question he granted to Daily Independence on why Nigerians who have always wanted true federalism voted for Buhari against Jonathan.
His words: "I believe our people were blindfolded; and it will be unfair to blame them. This is because our people, especially those in the diaspora keyed into the garbage propaganda of some of our selfish politicians in the South West. Some of this propaganda includes the one that says $49b was missing in the NNPC; another is that of the abduction of Chibok girls; these are the girls we are yet to see till today.
"We also have the issue of insecurity especially as regards the Boko Haram insurgency in the North- East. These are the three primary issues they used against Jonathan that made him lost out in the election. We know all these allegations were false and a calculated attempt to remove Jonathan from his position. We told our people all these but unfortunately, they refused to listen to us. They recruited some young guys who are adept in the use of the social media.
"They put these ones in situation rooms; tell them what to write, tell them who to abuse and also feeding young ones with lies and propaganda and so on. A lot of lies were peddled against me especially by then spokesman of APC, now Minister of Information. If you remember, two days to the presidential election, Lai Mohammed said we have recruited some OPC members that will be given army uniforms in order to rig the presidential election. When such a weighty allegations is leveled against someone, ethics of journalism requires that you call the accused hear his side of the story so as to have a balanced reporting.
"But unfortunately, most of our media did not bother to confirm from us and rather allow the lies to fly. By the time we want to make our clarifications, they will tell us that the false statement from Lai Mohammed has already gone into press. Two days to the governorship election, another story emanated from the same Lai Mohammed that I, former President Jonathan, (Musiliu) Obanikoro and Chief Bode George held a meeting to rig the governorship election against (Akinwunmi) Ambode. We also tried to state our side but the media did not publish it.
"On the day we were planning to hold a protest against some loopholes which we believed will lead to electoral malpractices such as over-age registration, creation of additional polling units in the North and shortage of Permanent Voters Cards for the entire South, Lai Mohammed also issued another statement that I collected N9.6b to organise protest against APC. After the protest, they also lied that we deliberately destroyed the billboards of Buhari and Ambode. They also said that we were brandishing all kinds of weapons and turned Lagos into a war zone. What we had was peaceful well-coordinated protest.
"The last time we had that kind of protest was in 1993, following the cancelation of June 12. Nothing less than 300,000 people turned out for that protest. They did all sort of things to tarnish my image. They even gave money to some OPC members that were expelled as far back as 2007 to be organising press conference abusing me. One of them, Shina Akinpelu, was even issuing statement from Ibadan challenging my authority and the media machinery of APC was coordinating it.
"We got wind of their spokesman in Lagos (Joe Igbokwe) who organised a press conference for them in one hotel located at Acme Road. When you use propaganda to clinch power and you don’t desist from that propaganda, it will turn Nigeria into a laughing stock in the comity of nations and that is already happening now."
(Culled from Daily Independent)
