By Omeiza Ajayi
ABUJA: The ruling All Progressives Congress APC has faulted former Vice President Atiku Abubakar over his allegation that the 2026 budgetary Service-Wide Vote, SWV, was set aside to fund President Bola Tinubu’s 2027 reelection campaign, describing the claim as either mischievous or a reflection of ignorance of basic public finance principles.
In a statement issued in Abuja on Wednesday, the party said the Presidential Candidate of the African Democratic Congress ADC had become more disoriented and misguided than ever before in the history of his presidential ambitions, adding that Atiku advanced no facts to support his claim beyond conjecture calculated to inflame and mislead Nigerians.
APC explained that a Service-Wide Vote is a long-established budgetary mechanism designed to cater for government-wide obligations and unforeseen expenditures that arise after the annual budget has been passed, and not a secret fund or illegal slush account as alleged by Atiku.
“You would think that a former Vice President, a man with the longest-standing ambition to be president of Nigeria, would understand the concept and instrument of a ‘Service-Wide Vote’, an elementary principle of public finance. A Service-Wide Vote is a long-established and widely used budgetary mechanism designed to cater for government-wide obligations and unforeseen expenditures that arise after the annual budget has been passed. Similar contingency arrangements exist in virtually all major economies and democracies of the world. A Service-Wide Vote is not a secret fund or an illegal slush account, as Atiku has baselessly and recklessly alleged,” said party spokesman, Felix Morka.
