The People’s Democratic Party (PDP) asserted that the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential campaign council had criticized Bola Tinubu’s manifesto. The PDP’s response?
Festus Keyamo, the Director of Public Affairs and Chief Spokesperson of the Tinubu/Shettima Presidential Campaign Council, issued a statement on Monday that stated that the PDP did not bother to read the document before making comments.
It will be reviewed that the PDP in an explanation by Dele Momodu on Sunday had in addition to other things, denounced the Tinubu/APC camp of copying the proclamation of the late MKO Abiola.
Momodu claims that Tinubu’s manifesto is a combination of the 1993 Abiola Hope manifesto and the 2015 manifesto of President Muhammadu Buhari.
Tinubu was slammed by the publisher of Ovation magazine for allowing some APC members to copy Abiola’s manifesto and repackage it for him.
However, Keyamo said in a statement on Monday that the ruling party is not entirely surprised, despite expressing disappointment in the PDP’s stance against Tinubu’s campaign manifesto.
He stated that Nigerians have rejected the PDP and that the drowning major opposition party is only attempting to hold on for dear life.
Keyamo went on to say that Momodu did a poor job of trying to criticize Tinubu’s 80-page manifesto, which was released on Friday and was titled “Renewed Hope 2023.”
According to the spokesperson for the Minister of Cum, the PDP came to power at a time when Nigeria was experiencing abundance, but they wasted the country’s resources by embezzling funds and spending without thinking.

Read the full statement below.

“It appears the Peoples Democratic Party is unaware that Nigerians have since dismissed it as an unserious and broken opposition party. If nothing at all, its latest press release signed by Chief Dele Momodu attests to its crass unseriousness.

“The PDP’s attempt to pooh-pooh our Action Plan only ended up as nothing but a joke. Even more pathetic and disastrous is the situation Chief Momodu has found himself today.

“That is, having to stage a complete somersault in a cheap hatchet job against our highly revered candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, simply because he needed to impress his new paymasters.

“Let us remind the turncoat, Dele Momodu of what he said about the same Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu only on October 26, 2019 in a column published in Thisday newspaper entitled, “Bola Tinubu And His Date With Destiny In 2023”: “I have no illusions that Tinubu will definitely perform as President of Nigeria, if he ever contests & wins. He has a knack for identifying brilliant minds and fertile brains, and the ability to nurture them to greatness. He has demonstrated this repeatedly and almost endlessly. Examples abound without doubt.

”What is obvious is that even the hirelings of the PDP like Momodu are clear believers in Asiwaju’s ability and capacity to deliver on his promises but have decided to play politics this time around.

“Our expectation is that our ACTION PLAN would inspire other political parties, especially the intellectually bankrupt PDP, to engage us constructively on the initiatives and programmes we intend to implement.

“True to type, PDP has again reacted, in our view, without even reading the content on the document. All they are interested in is the title of our message, not the quality of our ideas. We are extremely amused, but not entirely shocked.

“This only demonstrates once again their incurable incapacity to act as a credible opposition to the ruling party. Dele Momodu should have rather stayed in his accustomed lane of praise-singing socialites and the likes instead of dabbling in the more demanding job of critiquing policy statements. It is clearly not his forte! The quality of his recent write-up is a testament that his team is not made up of experts in governance and policy formulation. He must have gathered his team of photographers and video editors to read through a document that is far beyond their tabloid-centred minds. One would have expected Dele Momodu to make clear comparative analyses between Hope ‘93 campaign document of MKO Abiola and the Renewed Hope document of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

“He goofed miserably. He was just huffing and puffing without substance. A write-up that was intended to be a critique of a document on its supposed lack of details ended up itself as an empty shell.

“We are surprised that Dele Momodu could ask what our candidate is known for. Since he has asked either out of self denial or selective amnesia, we will answer him with his exact words in the past.

“Hear him in another portion of the aforementioned article: “Tinubu assembled a fantastic team of technocrats and created the gargantuan master plan for modern Lagos”.

“Dele Momodu has lived in Lagos for more than three decades. He surely knows the state of Lagos pre and post 1999. He has praised, on many occasions and at different fora, the imperishable legacies and monumental milestones of Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu in Lagos.

“In the same piece, Momodu narrated how Asiwaju Tinubu began the “systematic and robust increase of Lagos’ Internally Generated Revenue, making the state one of the richest self-sustaining governments in Africa”, and how “he single-handledly (sic) revived and revamped Local Governments in Lagos and brought developments to practically every part of the state.” Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu is known for “his glittering records and achievements in both private and public sectors.

“Can Dele Momodu also say this about his principal, Atiku Abubakar, whose time as Vice President has no other legacy to be remembered for other than the failed privatization exercise he was assigned to supervise where he sold national assets to his friends and cronies for peanuts?

“Should we remind you, Dele Momodu, of the distasteful remarks made by Fmr. President Olusegun Obasanjo on your party’s flag-bearer as Vice President?

“Of course, track records should be critical in evaluating any party or candidate. If we may ask Dele Momodu, what are your party’s track records? When the country had substantial receipts from crude oil export, your party squandered it all.

“PDP represent what the Yoruba proverbially call “Arungun” (squanderer). They promised the people of South-East Second Niger Bridge for 16 years, yet, nothing was built. Today, thanks to President Muhammadu Buhari of APC, the Second Niger Bridge is completed.

“At a time, a former spokesperson of your government said Nigeria couldn’t afford train coaches, much less rail lines. Today, we have Lagos – Ibadan, Itakpe – Warri rail lines. Even in the face of dwindling resources and global economic challenges, we have lifted millions of Nigerians out of poverty with our National Social Investment Programs, widely acclaimed as the first in Africa in scale and innovation.

“Nigeria has become a sufficient rice-growing nation, rated highest in rice and sorghum production in Africa by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), a status PDP thought was impossible.

“Our efforts in power generation and distribution is yielding good results, unlike the $16 billion squandered by PDP under Obasanjo under the guise of power projects with nothing to show for it. Pledges made by PDP governments are being redeemed by our party.

“Pensions and other entitlements of workers in PDP’s failed privatisation scam have been paid up to date.

“Sure, like Dele Momodu once said before he took up his new mercenary job from PDP, Asiwaju has “too many technocrats to pick his team from.” He is surrounded by “brilliant, intelligent, accomplished and cosmopolitan leaders” across all sectors, spheres and walks of life.

“He will hit the ground running when he takes over power in May 2023, by the grace of God and most Nigerians. As he did in Lagos state, he will assemble “quality and talented leaders” in his cabinet that will see to the delivery of our campaign promises.

“On the contrary, the 5-point agenda of the flag bearer of the PDP is nothing to write home about. Top on the list is his lip service to unify Nigeria. We can only laugh.

“This is a man that his party is torn between division and disarray. Till now, he is yet to fix it. What a failure! His 74-page campaign document has in it ongoing milestones of the President Muhammadu Buhari led administration.”