The opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), yesterday, slammed the Presidency for saying Nigerians especially critics would be left with no option but to applaud the President Muhammadu Buhari-led government at the end of its tenure in 2023.
The Presidency had in a statement signed by Femi Adesina, presidential aide on media and publicity, to mark the sixth year of the All Progressives Congress APC-led administration, recently gave Buhari a pass mark in governance, adding that come 2023, even the hardest of critics would do same owing to what it called the giant strides recorded since Buhari took over the leadership of the country in 2015.
Reacting to this development, the PDP through its spokesman, Kola Ologbondiyan, said the lack of feedback mechanism to collate and disseminate the feeling of Nigerians to the first citizen is the sole reason the Presidency “is living in a world of fantasy.”
According to the publicity scribe, “The Presidency has no way of identifying the problems this government has caused Nigerians. They sit down and reel out false performance indices which bear no relationship with the realities Nigerians are living in.
“Across every area of our national life, the nation and her citizens are bleeding. Insecurity is at its worst, hunger, hopelessness, unemployment to mention just a few are at an all-time high.
“How then can anyone applaud the manager of such a country given the clear lack of initiative to make things work?” he asked rhetorically.
Ologbondiyan however noted that the two years left in the second stint of Buhari may be enough to change the narrative if the Commander-in-Chief muster the political will to heed the calls for restructuring as well signing the Electoral Act Amendment Bill into law.
“If he wants to be applauded, he should listen to the people and reposition Nigeria in order for it to work for all of us.
“First, he should give us a new electoral law that will facilitate free, fair, credible, and transparent elections. Nigeria cannot be taken seriously with the manner elections have been conducted in the country, particularly in the past six years.
“Two, the nation needs to be restructured. Restructuring will unlock the potentials of local and state governments, make them self-reliant rather than beggars always waiting for monthly federal allocations.
“If he can deliver on these two, Nigerians will remember him for good but there is nothing to applaud him for in the past six years. That is the truth and Nigerians know it,” he added.
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