Don’t sell your PVCs to Fayose, APC tells voters

The All Progressives Congress in Ekiti State has urged students and artisans not to surrender their Permanent Voter Cards to Governor Ayodele Fayose in exchange for money.The party was reacting to alleged complaints of massive mop-up of PVCs in exchange for cash being carried out among artisans and students of tertiary institutions in the state.But Fayose had said there was no reason for him to buy voter cards from the same people who had demonstrated their love for him in the governorship election.The state Publicity Secretary of APC, Mr. Taiwo Olatubosun, said the mop-up of PVCs among voters was nothing but “a callous mortgaging of the future of Ekiti youths.”Olatunbosun alleged that the governor recently visited the School of Health Technology, Ijero; College ofEducation, Ikere; Ekiti State University, Ado-Ekiti and some other institutions where he deceived students to surrender their PVCs for cash.He told the students that the challenge before them was beyond immediate pecuniary gain, saying their future was more important than the momentary pleasure aimed at enslaving Nigerian youths.Olatunbosun said, “We ask; what is Fayose doing with all these PVCs? The governor has asked teachersto submit their PVCs. He wants to repeat the electoral fraud he perpetrated on June 21, 2014 governorship elections which is still being contested in court.“Ekiti teachers should extract a written commitment from Fayose to restore teachers 27.5 per cent peculiar allowance, 20 per cent core subject allowance and 20 per cent rural posting allowance introduced by former Governor Kayode Fayemi to show that he is serious and not that he is using them for electoral gains.“Your PVCs are the only power you have to decide your future. Once you submit the photocopies of yourPVCs, it will be cloned and will become useless to you on the election day. Be warned! Don’t give the photocopies of your PVCs to anybody for any amount.”The APC spokesman asked artisans to be wary of Fayose’s directive asking them to bring their PVCs in exchange for CBN loan for Small and Medium Scale Enterprises, stressing that the programme had already been processed by the Fayemi administration.He explained that it was fraudulent for Fayose to now use the loan to deceive the artisans into collectingtheir PVCs.“The unsuspecting members of the public should know that the loan will be paid back and it is not for political patronage so they should not be deceived by this. On no account should they submit their PVCsor the photocopies,” Olatunbosun warned.But Fayose’s Special Assistant on Information, Mr. Lanre Ogunsuyi, said the governor did not need to buy the people’s love.He said, “Governor Fayose does not need to buy the people’s love. You will recall that even before he was governor, his souvenirs were bought by his supporters who are people of Ekiti State as against others who are distributing their souvenirs free.“He has no reason to buy voter cards from the same people who have demonstrated their love for him in the governorship election and since assuming office, he has been showing his love for the people through ‘stomach infrastructure,’ construction, payment of salaries and searching for jobs for the unemployed youths in federal agencies and the N2bn SMEs loans for youths, market women and artisans.”