The presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, Atiku Abubakar, on Friday, disowned a viral audio in which he’s allegedly heard discussing how to rig Saturday’s presidential election.
Atiku’s running mate Governor Ifeanyi Okowa and the chairman of the PDP Presidential Campaign Council, Aminu Tambuwal, in the said audio recording, are heard speaking on the alleged plan with Atiku.
But in a swift reaction, the PDP presidential candidate dismissed the said audio recording as “utter rubbish,” dismissing it as the handiwork of the opposition which he had envisaged.
One of the spokespersons for the Atiku campaign, Phrank Shuaibu, said in a statement that any attentive listener would know that audio was fake.
According to the statement, “We warned last week that as the election approaches, there will be a spike in the rate of propaganda on social media. With barely 24 hours to the poll, we have witnessed propaganda from not just the All Progressives Congress but the Labour Party as well.
“In this latest drivel, a montage of speeches delivered by Atiku, Tambuwal, and Okowa since last year were manipulated and pieced together to give an impression that they were discussing plans to rig Saturday’s election. In this age of artificial intelligence technology, even dead people can be portrayed as delivering speeches. This is nothing new.
“For the record, Atiku has run in two presidential elections and has never been indicted or prosecuted for election violence or vote buying.
“But some people think they can sell a narrative of Atiku manipulating this election. This is indeed the height of desperation, the last kick of a dying horse. The APC and the Labour Party must note that elections are not won on social media but at the polling units.”