The ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has been caught padding its manifesto for the 2019 elections with materials copied from foreign websites without attribution.
The brazen plagiarism, which appeared from the title of the party’s ‘plan’ for energy infrastructure, comes amidst complaints of a worsening disregard for intellectual property rights in the country.
President Muhammadu Buhari apologised in 2016 after being caught using lines of a speech once delivered by former American President Barack Obama without attribution.
Only last week, Segun Sowunmi, a spokesperson of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party presidential campaign organisation, also apologised for stealing a speech from President Donald Trump and claiming it as his original thought in a New Year message on Facebook.
In the manifesto it recently uploaded on its website, the APC said its priority was to “ensure a safe and secure America“, setting itself up for scrutiny of the rest of the document which was designed to convince Nigerians that the party deserved reelection at the poll next month.
A google search of the first paragraph under the power’s proposal for power infrastructure revealed that the words were lifted in verbatim from either of a slew of website where they previously appeared, and without any attribution.
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The paragraph reads: “Assertively pontificate long-term high-impact testing procedures wiProgressively synergize timely action items and business “outside the box” thinking. Distinctively foster best-of-breed markets before collaborative schemas. Authoritatively embrace tactical potentialities vis-a-vis low-risk high-yield architectures. Completely administrate robust testing procedures vis-a-vis dynamic testing procedures. Globally fabricate functional intellectual capital for B2B e-services.”
The possible places where the party might have lifted the lines included one American political action page and and an Ivoirien energy website.
It was not immediately clear which one the party plagiarised amongst the websites, who appeared to have similarly plagiarised one another.
The development exposed the little input which politicians often showed towards their literary works before being published.
It does not appear like Mr Buhari or Vice President Yemi Osinbajo made much inputs in the document. Instead, there is a high possibility that they were given to consultants to draft with little supervision or contribution.
Premium Times
