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From Okwe Obi, Abuja
Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has described as bad allegation against the Governorship Candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Enugu State, Peter Mbah, that he forged his discharged National Youth Service Corps certificate.
HURIWA’s National Coordinator Emmanuel Onwubiko, at a press briefing yesterday in Abuja, described two Nongovernmental organizations; Total Support for Rule of Law and Justice Initiative and Enugu Progressive Forum, as political tools deployed by political oppositions in Enugu State to wage reckless campaign of calumny against Mbah.
Onwubiko recalled that the untraceable groups alleged that the NYSC in a letter dated 1st February, 2023, confirmed that it did not issue the said Certificate of National Service presented to INEC by Mbah just as the Coordinator of the Total Support for Rule of Law and Justice Initiative and Enugu Progressive Forum, , Cynthia Mabeokwu, in the copy of the letter released the Corps, in paragraph 2 of the letter said: “We are pleased to inform you that the Certificate of National Service belonging to Mba Peter Ndubuisi with Certificate Number: A808297 forwarded for verification was not issued by the NYSC.”
According to him, the groups had cited provisions of the Constitution, and said that any votes cast in favour of Mbah for the election were bound to be declared wasted and void as they were votes cast for a person who was ab initio not qualified to stand for the elections just as they wrongly said that by Section 182(1)(j)of the 1999 Constitution as amended, the Constitution provides: Section 182(1) No person shall be qualified for election to the office of Governor of a State if (j) He has presented a forged certificate to the Independent National Electoral Commission.
He lambasted the groups for “attempting to blackmail the Governorship Candidate of the PDP in Enugu State by contracting persons alleged to be members of a syndicate within the headquarters of the National Youth Service Corps to choreograph a false narrative concerning the certificate duly issued by the NYSC to Peter Mbah who is without any shadow of doubts, a University graduate in his own merit and who has no antecedents or associated with any certificate scam.
“We challenge the groups to institute a court case if they think their thinking their deceptive and wayward allegations could stand the test of time.
“We have independently conducted our findings and determined that these interlopers identifying themselves as non governmental organisations only exists in the imagination of the faceless drivers driving the groups with the sole aim of seeking to tarnish the unassailable image of the PDP candidate for the office of Governor of Enugu State.
“By the way, the highest qualification to seek for elective offices in Nigeria is school certificate or its equivalent as decided by the Supreme court of Nigeria in the matter between His Excellency Atiku Abubakar versus President Muhammadu Buhari.”
