The African Action Congress (AAC) has urged Nigerians to resist the untold hardship the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration has brought upon them.
The party, in a statement issued by the National Publicity Secretary, Femi Adeyeye, said Nigerians should be willing to take to the streets and at the polls to take back their land from saboteurs who have brought to ruins, the economy of the country.
According to the party, the All Progressives Congress-led government is very incompetent in light of the recent fuel scarcity saga and consistent power failure resulting from the national grid collapse.
The party noted that Nigerians are facing serious hardships, as schools are currently locked due to the ongoing strike action by the Academic Staff Union of Universities while the Minister of Petroleum and Education are currently outside the country — a sign that they have no respect for the citizens.
A statement from the AAC reads, “The African Action Congress (AAC) seizes this medium to express once again its stance of solidarity with the poor and suffering people of Nigeria.
“We call on all Nigerians going through untold hardship to resist by organizing to take over the streets as we also prepare to take over the polls in 2023.
“As a party, we believe that no section of the ruling class or their agents has the moral authority to tell Nigerians where, how and when they should resist injustice. You can’t beat a child and tell the child not to cry or want to determine when the child should cry.
“This is in response to those who are telling Nigerians to only wait till the 2023 elections for any action whatsoever.
“How many more Nigerians must die due to poverty before 2023? How many more of our children must die of preventable diseases before 2023?
“How many businesses must close down before 2023? How many more, before 2023 should be killed by bandits, terrorists and other criminal gangs? Because of unpaid salaries and allowances, how many Unions must go on strike before 2023?
“We maintain that the time to resist is long overdue and that Nigerians should start mobilizing towards #OccupyNigeria2022.
“The sight of Nigerians queuing endlessly at fueling stations is gory and should not be the lot of an oil-producing country, not even in the 21st century.
“It is worrisome that while other countries are working assiduously to make a shift away from fossil fuels, the clueless APC government is not making any efforts.
“It has rather continued to make as our streets so disquiet due to noises from generators and very polluted, as their “political” national grid keeps collapsing.
“Businesses are seriously affected as the costs of production and operation are astronomically high. More businesses are forced to shut down hereby increasing the already high unemployment rate. Prices of food and other commodities are leaping per second. We are a loaf away from abject famine.
“The artificial scarcity created by the Buhari regime has gone worse to the extent that people are now forced to buy PMS for as high as 400 Naira/litre in different parts of the country. The petroleum price regulatory body has gone to sleep, while the Minister of Petroleum himself is busy treating one illness or the other in London.
“The Minister for Education, Mr Adamu who should, in an ideal society lose sleep over the lingering ASUU strike has also joined in the trip to the London annex. It is a fact that Nigerians are actually being taken for granted by the Buhari regime.
“Isn’t it very unfortunate that Nigeria is the only member of Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) that imports 95 per cent of refined petroleum product to meet its domestic consumption?
“This is despite spending a whopping total of 17 billion dollars on both Turn Around Maintenance (TAM) of the moribund public refineries and on private refineries, including the wasteful Greenwich refineries program that gulped over 3 billion dollars.
“Other member countries meet their demand by refining locally. It is utter shame that from 2012 till now, a space of 10 years, the major reason for the massive #OccupyNIGERIA protests has not been resolved by the duo of APC and PDP governments.
“Buhari’s friends in the Power Generation Companies (GenCos) are already holding Nigerians to ransom with the claim that Nigeria would remain in darkness except they are paid 1.644 trillion Naira by the Nigerian Bulk Electricity Trading Plc. This is the woeful result of their much-touted privatization and deregulation policy.
“To cap it all is the closure of our schools. Our youths are being rendered idle at home while the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU) slug it out with the Federal Government over the revitalization of public education- a demand it has championed for over 23 years.
“Their Polytechnic counterparts have also threatened to go on total strike, just as the Senior Staff Association of Nigerian Universities (SSANU) joined in the festival of resistance. All these have raised the furore in our society and frustration is on the rise. We can’t just continue like this. Nigerians can save what’s left. We can save it NOW.
“It is to this understanding, we at the African Action Congress (AAC) call on Nigerians home and abroad not to sit down and watch the country slide into a completely failed state. But to bond, engage with the pro-people programs of the AAC and demand an end to hardship, for it is time to resist this clueless regime. It’s time to send them packing once and for all.
“Resist hardship on the streets. Resist at the polls.”
