Date: 2018-12-07

The Kwara state chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has described one of the Federal Government's social investment programme, TaderMoni as a vote buying gimmick by the All Progressives Congress (APC) led administration.

The accusation of the PDP is coming on the heels of scheduled visit of the Vice-President, Prof Yomi Osinbajo this week to launch the programme.

In a statement by the party's State Publicity Secretary, Tunde Ashaolu, made available to National Pilot, the party said "it welcomed the Vice-President and his entourage to the State of harmony and wish them a successful flag off of the programme".

It however called on the Vice-President and his team to ensure the scheme is devoid of political influences even though "we strongly believe the programme is a vote-buying gimmick by the All Progressives Congress (APC) led government ahead of the 2019 general elections".

The party noted that the scheme was launched in 2015 and in the past three years, the Vice-President did not visit any state for TraderMoni, adding that "but few months to the general elections, he has been going round markets in different states of the country to distribute money to traders and artisans.

"We want to believe this is not a ploy by the APC to induce them ahead of the elections", the PDP added. "Nevertheless, the Kwara PDP warns against the partisanship of the initiative and advises that there should be no discrimination in the selection of beneficiaries in the State.

"The Vice-President and his team must ensure that beneficiaries are selected without recourse to political affiliations. As this is a government scheme and not a party affair, beneficiaries must cut across political divides.

"We demand that criteria for selection be made transparent and strictly adhered to, and all beneficiary traders and artisans must follow the normal procedure irrespective of where they belong.

"Tradermoni is a programme for all Nigerians and not just for the APC alone. We, therefore, call on the Vice-president to include representatives of other political parties in the flag-off ceremony of the scheme in Kwara", the party submitted