Speaking to PREMIUM TIMES via his closest political associate and national secretary of his party, Buba Galadima, Mr. Buhari said the presidency and the ruling party were already preparing the ground to harass, arrest and incarcerate him.
“They are just trying to give us a bad name in order to hang us,” Mr. Galadima told this newspaper in a telephone interview. “We know that they are already planning to arrest the General and I, they are just preparing grounds for their actions.”
Mr Buhari was reacting to statements issued by the the presidency and the national headquarters of the Peoples Democratic Party describing him as a serial election loser and blood thirsty politician, who is in the habit of inciting his supporters to violence.
The PDP and the presidency issued the statements in reaction to comments attributed to Mr. Buhari on Monday where he said the Nigerian government, led by President Goodluck Jonathan of the ruling PDP, is more deadly than the extremist Boko Haram sect and that any attempt to rig the 2015 election would be firmly resisted.
In its statement, released at a hurriedly convened press conference, the PDP said the leader of the opposition Congress for Progressive Change had become unstable and is being haunted by what it described as "combat withdrawal syndrome."
The party also described the retired army general as excessively blood thirsty.
Shortly afterwards, the presidency came out smoking describing Mr. Buhari as a serial election looser renowned for inciting Nigerians to violence.
But speaking to PREMIUM TIMES after the statements were released, Mr. Buhari said rather than him, it was the PDP and the Jonathan-led Federal Government that were the real threat to peace in the country.
“It is those who organise the rigging of elections that are trying to disrupt the peace, not Buhari,” the former head of state said, through Mr. Galadima.
Mr. Galadima also said the PDP and the presidency only came up with the allegations because the government “is planning to arrest Buhari and I, and so they are using Monday’s remarks as an excuse.”
“It is not General that is threatening peace, rather it is the action of the PDP that is leading to bloodbath, they have infected us with bloodbath,” he added.
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