The Coalition of Civil Society Organizations for Tinubu/Shettima 2023 has appealed to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, and his Labour Party counterpart, Peter Obi, to withdraw the petition against President Bola Tinubu and join him in his bid to ensure national unity and an all-inclusive government.
Both Atiku and Obi are in court challenging the outcome of the 2023 presidential election, where Tinubu of the APC was declared the winner.
The National Coordinator of the group, Lilian Ogbole, made the appeal while addressing a press conference on Thursday, June 22, 2023, in Abuja, saying the appeal is expedient because the Tinubu-led administration has demonstrated its willingness to work tenaciously to bring peace, growth, and progress to Nigeria.
Ogbole stated that Nigerians all over the world and the international community are impressed with Tinubu’s handling of serious national issues and the transformational reforms and socio-economic policies and initiatives he has implemented since he came into office.
She emphasized that the bold policies and decisions taken by Mr. President and his Renewed Hope Initiative are progressively yielding expedited relief and reassurance of hope for Nigerians and the African continent.
Ogbole went on to say that as stakeholders in the Nigerian project, they felt it was necessary to call on all selfless, well-meaning Nigerians and patriots across party lines to shield their swords regardless of “political affiliation and alignment, religion, or tribe” and embrace this transformational government of national unity and inclusiveness.
She stated: “We resolved to say unequivocally loud and clear, here and now that the victory in the last presidential election is a victory for all Nigerians regardless of their political affiliation and alignment, religion or tribe, it is indeed a victory for Africa, the entire black race and of course victory for the entire world and humanity at large; it was a no victor no vanquish election.
“President Bola Tinubu’s government has thus far proved beyond every reasonable doubt to be transformational in nature with huge potential to reunite, revitalize, renew and reposition Nigeria for a breakthrough to an uninterrupted era of progress and prosperity, hence the need for all hands to be on deck.
“Even though we are aware that it is the fundamental right of all aggrieved candidates to seek for redress in the court of law, in the national interest we wish to use this avenue to crave the indulgence of all aggrieved candidates who are seeking redress in the tribunal to withdraw their litigations against the president and join hands with him in the proposed national unity and all-inclusive government”.
While appealing, the group stated that it was certain that the priority of all other political party candidates was to act selflessly in the national interest, and that since Tinubu was carrying out their intentions, they could and should go a step further to collaborate with him to achieve the same patriotic objective.
The group further emphasized that this was the only way to demonstrate to the world that their fight was not personal and selfish, but rather in the national interest and quest to reclaim Nigeria’s dignity through the establishment and implementation of people-friendly policies.
They further appealed to all elder statesmen across the country to convene a round table conference with all aggrieved parties and appeal to them not to subvert the will of the people through diversions, but to join hands with the legitimate government Nigerians elected to run their affairs.
