The Labour Party has alleged that the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the ruling All Progressives Congress has bought, intimidated and blackmailed government institutions to their bidding.

Spokesman for the LP Campaign Organisation, Yunusa Tanko, disclosed this in reaction to Sunday’s appeal court judgment that sacked Plateau State governor, Caleb Mutfwang of the Peoples Democratic Party.

The court therefore declared Nentawe Goshwe of the All Progressives Congress as the winner of the March 18 governorship election, and ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission to withdraw the Certificate of Return issued to the governor and present a new one to Mr Goshwe.

The ruling made Mr Mutfwang the third opposition governor to be sacked by the Court of Appeal within three days, and some opposition parties fingered the APC as the mastermind.

Recall that the court had on Thursday, sacked Governor Dauda Lawal of Zamfara State, declaring the governorship election inconclusive, and also nullified the election of the Kano State Governor, Abba Kabir Yusuf of the New Nigeria Peoples Party on Friday.

In his reaction to the sack of the three opposition governors, Mr Tanko alleged that the rulings might have been the handy work of ‘vicious’ persons in the executive arm of government.

He accused the government of manipulating the judiciary to capture the states, warning that if not challenged, they would completely clean other parties from the political scene.

Mr Tanko said, “As I said earlier, these particular sets of people in power are vicious politicians. I repeat the word vicious again for emphasis. Gradually, we are beginning to witness completely captured states where all the institutions have already been bought, intimidated or blackmailed to do the bidding of the present political party and the government in power.

“There is no hanky-panky about it. They are clear on what they want to do and they are putting our democracy in power. It is now left for us to really challenge these particular people otherwise they are going to take us completely to the cleaners. And they don’t care how, when, and where they do it as long as it favours them. This is the danger.

“Now the electorates are being discouraged from going out to vote for candidates of their choice knowing that the mandate can be snatched. They are already in control of the state apparatus.

“We had a similar situation at a point when the Peoples Democratic Party was in power. These particular people in power will be referencing how virtually everybody was joining the PDP (during President Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration) then.

“There was no clear ideology and that was what gave birth to the APC conglomerate. But in this case, it is a different matter entirely. These people in power are just too vicious.”