Labour Party (LP) Director of Contact and Mobilisation (Diaspora), Dr Patrick Osagie Eholor, otherwise known as Ultimate Equals, has raised alarm over what he termed a systematic plot by the APC led Federal government and the judiciary to silence Nigerians by violating their constitutional rights.
Eholor in a statement was reacting to the Presidential Election Tribunal Judges decision to block live coverage of proceedings.
Eholor who cried out over the development, said that since 2015, the Freedom of Information Act has been violated in several instances by the government when there is plan to achieve any goal that is against the will of Nigerians.
Giving instances, he mentioned how protesters and journalists were attacked and harrased at the Lekki toll gate during the #EndSARS protest.
He argued that Nigerians have been denied their rights to know what could benefit or harm them by the government.
Eholor said: “From the action of the judges not to allow live transmission of the proceedings at the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal, it is not in doubt that there are plans for our votes during the Presidential Election some months ago to be turned over to the highest bidder.
“This is sacrilegious and unbecoming. Our vote is supposed to be counted wholly at the different polling units and recorded for posterity to judge that it was devoid of any hanky-panky. If not for INEC boss, Mahmood Yakubu’s inefficiency, we would not have needed to go to the courts to determine who won the elections.
“If Yakubu and INEC have done the needful we wouldn’t have had any business going to court. A lot of people don’t have respect for the judiciary in Nigeria. It is not a strange thing in all parts of the world to have live coverage of court proceedings. There are cameras in every courtroom in Europe and America, why is it a different case in Nigeria?
“The judiciary is the last hope of the common man. What Nigerians are asking for is our right. It is not Peter Obi and Atiku Abubakar that are being denied live telecast of the court proceedings but Nigerians most of whom got maimed, killed and in some instances dehumanised for insisting on letting their votes count.”
“This is how they switched off the lights at Lekki Toll Gate, before descending on our youths to kill them.
Thyy switched off electronic transmission of results and rigged the elections massively.
Now, they have banned mobile phones at the Elections Tribunal.
“It is the same crude introduction of darkness to quench the light that they have always used to oppress Nigerians.
I hope you all are paying attention”.