President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration has assures a smooth transition of power to the new administration to be led by ‘president-elect’, Bola Tinubu.
This is coming up despite suits filed by the presidential candidates of the Labour Party (LP) and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) at the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal sitting at the Court of Appeal in Abuja to challenge the outcome of the poll of the 2023 presidential election.
Chairman of the Presidential Transition Council, PTC, and Secretary to Government of the Federation SGF, Mr Boss Mustapha, disclosed this to journalists in Abuja.
“On May 29th, there would be a peaceful formal transfer of power to the new President, the litigation would not prevent the handover ceremony from taking place”, he said.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), which conducted the presidential election declared Tinubu the winner, having polled a total of 8,794,726 to defeat his closest rivals and candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar and Peter Obi, who polled 6,984, 520 and 6,101,533 respectively.
Mustapha said the council’s activities were not affected by the activities of partisans at the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal, noting that it had broken down into several subcommittees to ensure effective discharge of its mandate.
He also added that Buhari will not stay beyond the time allowed by the constitution.
“The security committee has the responsibility to ensure that nothing happens to truncate the transition process. Nigerians are very law-abiding people,” he said.
“There are provided avenues for those” who lost in the election “to make whatever legal inquiry they want to make but the process would continue unabated”.
“We would not create another constitutional crisis; on May 29, the handing over will take place,” he assured.
Mustapha further said; the refurbishment of offices for the president and vice-president-elect has been completed”.
“The facility at the Defence House is ready. Security personnel of the Department of State Services and the Nigeria Police Force have also been deployed to the president and vice-president-elect.
“Protocol officers from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the National Intelligence Agency have also been assigned to both the president and vice president-elect,” he added.
