Gov Aminu Waziri Tambuwal of Sokoto State has urged the leaders of the All Progressives Congress, APC, and their supporters to join his administration in moving the state forward.
In a statement by senior Special Assistant on Special Duties, Yusuf Dingiadi, on Sunday in Kaduna, Tambuwal said that the March 9 Governorship and State House of Assembly elections were won and lost, “it is time to move on.“
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) recalls that after supplementary elections in parts of the state, INEC had declared Gov Tambuwal of the PDP, winner with a slim margin of 341 votes.
Tambuwal scored 512,002 votes, while his main challenger, Ahmed Aliyu of the APC, got 511,661 votes in the Governorship race.
Tambuwal, however, said that, while his doors remain open for all to join the PDP-led-government in steering the affairs of state, his administration would not condone any form of post-election violence in any part of the state.
He urged aggrieved political parties and persons not to resort to violence, but should approach the Election Petition Tribunal to peacefully seek redress in accordance with the law.
On Saturday, the Chairman of the Sokoto State chapter of the APC, Alhaji Isa Sadiq, assured members of the plan to retrieve what he described as “party’s Gubernatorial mandate stolen by the Peoples Democratic Party at all cost.“
He said “such deluded and misplaced outcries by Governor Tambuwal, are inefficacious, just as they are immaterial and ineffectual.
“ Nobody had used the powers or prowess of any federal agency, rather, the teeming supporters of the party and the electorate, statewide had cast their votes massively for the APC candidates, at all levels.
“The massive and colossal votes cast for our candidates, at all levels, including President Muhammadu Buhari, showed that, the people love and cherish the APC and it remains the party to beat.
“ The electorate had since lost confidence in the PDP which had fielded expired and lesser candidates who lacked even the least of support.”
“The APC is extremely optimistic that the stolen mandate would be retrieved at the Gubernatorial Election Tribunal, which is expected to commence sitting in Sokoto soon,’’ he said.
