The Atiku/Okowa Presidential Campaign yesterday said the hoarding of the new Naira notes by the Presidential Candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu, is causing Nigerians unimaginable pain and destroying their means of livelihood.
The campaign said Tinubu is shedding crocodile tears and pointing accusing fingers at others and posturing as champions of the people, when they are the real enemies of Nigerians.
Spokesperson, Atiku/Okowa Campaign Organization, Kola Ologbondiyan, said they stand with Nigerians in calling on Tinubu and his "co-travelers in the APC" to end the criminal activities of intercepting and hoarding the new notes, for their vote buying plots not minding the excruciating hardship their sinister action is causing millions of Nigerians across the country.
Ologbondiyan noted that Atiku's campaign is alarmed by the exposed plot by Tinubu Campaign and some APC Governors to secretly swap a whooping N22.5 billion in old N1000 new notes in Kano as well as Lagos State where they will be warehoused for vote buying for the deflated Tinubu campaign.
"The Tinubu Campaign is desperate to mop up new Naira notes by swapping them with their ill-gotten old notes stashed away in secret vaults, because, having been rejected by Nigerians, they had relied solely on vote-buying, financial inducements and heavy bribing to compromise and derail the electoral process.
"Our campaign is disturbed by the harrowing experiences being faced by Nigerians who are at the receiving end of the Tinubu Campaign induced cash scarcity ravaging our nation at this time.
"More disgusting is that the Tinubu Campaign has disgracefully resorted to hypocritical propaganda, shedding of crocodile tears, pointing accusing fingers at others and posturing as champions of the people, when they are the real enemies of Nigerians.
"The Tinubu Campaign, in its fear of the looming failures at the February 25 polls, has turned out like a desperate ferocious wolf seeking to devour the people while at the same time trying to cloak itself in the innocent skin of a sheep.
"It is however devastating to see Nigerians sleeping in the cold at ATM centers, assaulted by the elements of nature, fighting one another in banking halls and ATM stalls in the struggle to get some little cash just because the Tinubu Campaign and corrupt APC leaders had diverted the new notes for their selfish political reasons.
"We find it disheartening that Tinubu and his allies are taking Nigerians from APC induced seven years of weaponized hunger to a wholesome poverty by triggering this unbearable cash scarcity that has wrecked small businesses, destabilized homes and sunk millions of Nigerians into deeper financial abyss.
"Already, Nigerians are forced to face a worse situation than the COVID 19 experience just because Tinubu is hoarding the new Naira notes to manipulate the 2023 presidential election.
"Our Campaign counsels Tinubu to lift his knees from the neck of Nigerians by ending his new Naira notes hoarding activities so that the new notes can freely flow to Nigerians to run their daily lives," he said.
Ologbondiyan urged Nigerians not to succumb to Tinubu's design but remain steadfast in their determination to resist him and free our nation from the shackles of oppressors by voting in Atiku Abubakar as the next President of Nigeria so that he can commence the work of rebuilding our nation for the good of all.