We’ve exceeded membership target - APC

 
The All Progressives Congress (APC) said yesterday it has exceeded its membership target because Nigerians see it as a mass movement rather than a mere political party.


“This explains why we have extended the registration period by two days,” it said.

The party accused the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) of sponsoring the sabotage of its (APC’s) membership registration in several states.

It noted that the ruling party’s rush to the media to condemn the registration showed it as a cog in the wheel of democracy.

In a statement yesterday in Lagos by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said since one of the ways to truncate democracy was by stifling popular participation, the PDP should be accused of working to truncate Nigeria’s democracy by its campaign of lies against the APC membership registration.

The party explained that the registration was meant to give “many Nigerians a chance to be part of their country’s democracy.”

It said the reason the PDP called a hurried media briefing to spew out lies on the registration was because the it saw the handwriting on the wall and became jittery.

APC said: “The PDP is wrong about its claim that the APC is engaging in phantom registration. The party should know that while anyone can manufacture numbers, no one can manufacture human beings. Therefore, in the fullness of time, any party that gives a fake number of its membership will get its comeuppance.

“The truth is that within the first three days of our registration, we had met and exceeded the target we set for ourselves. Nigerians have flocked to our party, which they have come to see more as a mass movement than just a political party. This explains why we have extended the registration by two days. The PDP is aware of the acceptability of the APC and has started quivering,” APC said.

The party said instead of splitting hairs over the phenomenal APC registration, the PDP should launch its membership drive, to know what Nigerians think of it.

“PDP officials should not just sit in their Abuja offices and make phantom allegations about some party engaging in phantom registration, they should go out there and see for themselves what is going on, and how Nigerians are streaming aboard the train of change that the APC has become,” it said.

APC also advised the PDP to stop the sabotage of its membership registration by sponsoring attacks on officials and hijacking materials in Abia and Rivers; bribing some fifth columnists to sabotage the process in Delta, and burning “our secretariat in Gombe.”

The party denied getting any assistance from the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) or using any material obtained from the commission, “except, of course, if the public spaces we are using for the registration are now being seen by the PDP as INEC property.”

APC added: “The PDP accused the APC of trying to truncate the country’s democracy simply because the party (APC) is giving Nigerians the opportunity to exercise their right to associate freely. It is now clear to discerning Nigerians that it is the PDP that is truncating our democracy by blocking popular participation and preventing Nigerians from exercising their rights.”
nigerianeye