From Sylvanus Viashima, Jalingo
The spokesperson of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in Taraba State, Mr Andeta’rang Irammae, on Tuesday disclosed that the state governor, Darius Ishaku, is not campaigning for the governorship candidate of the party Col Kefas Agbu because he was too occupied with governance and not because of any feud between the duo.
There are concerns at some quarters in the state that the governor, who recently lost his senatorial ambition to the candidate of the APC, is angry with the party and candidate for not doing enough to help him win and has decided to boycott the campaigns.
Andeta’rang cleared the air on this at a Press conference at the Party secretariat in Jalingo while reacting to allegations from the APC that the PDP was planning to rig Saturday’s election in the state.
Andeta’rang, who urged the people to disregard the allegations of plans to rig the election accused the APC of attacking Capt. Douglas Yahaha, Candidate of the party for Donga state constituency, who was on his way to Bibinu for his campaign.
“The state governor is concerned with governance and is often constrained, that is why he is not following our candidate for the campaign tour as is always the practice. I can assure you that there is no feud between them. But should we ignore and allow governance to suffer because we have an election? That’s not right and it won’t be fair to the people.
“It came to us as a surprise that a former Chairman of APC in the state on Sunday addressed the Press where he alleged that the PDP is planning to rig massively in the forthcoming election because the concept of rigging is alien to us. Since 1999, the people entrusted the leadership of the state to the hands of the PDP. So there has never been any reason for us to rig. If we did not rig in 1999 to date, I can assure you that we would not start now. As a party, we don’t believe in cutting corners.”
The spokesperson who expressed confidence that the party would win at Saturday’s polls urged the APC to campaign with decency and decorum rather than resulting in crude measures that could plunge the state into unnecessary crisis.
Our correspondent recalls that a chieftain of the APC in the State Alhaji Hassan Jika Ardo on Sunday disclosed that the ruling PDP has perfected plans to scuttle the March 18 general election in the state by using INEC officials and security agencies to rig their way through.