Onyebuchi Ezigbo in Abuja
A chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Director General of the Voice of Nigeria (VON), Mr. Osita Okechukwu, has deplored the decision of former President Olusegun Obasanjo to ascribe corruption and incompetence to President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration.
He said the former president did not have the moral grounds to paint the present administration in bad light.
Okechukwu who spoke yesterday in Abuja while receiving a group of supporters of President Buhari under the auspices of Buhari National Students Support Group, said the main reason former President Obasanjo and others ganged up against President Buhari was because he was determined to stamp out corruption.
“We can understand that the gang-up is to go back to share the money. I was taken aback at the statement credited to the former president and elder statesman, Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo (rtd). I was one of those who listened to him when he came out of the prison. I think the luck he has is that there are no searchlight on what happened in his post 2007, the establishment of Bell University, and other assets,” he said.
“You know when you go to the Revenue Mobilisation and Fiscal Commission to check how much he earned both as salaries and allowances, former President Obasanjo cannot genuinely and sincerely talk about corruption. The press first reported him that he is neutral but he said he is not neutral and that he cannot be sleeping when the country is so corrupt.
“Here was the president when a barrel of oil was sold for over $100 and it nosedived to below $40 when President Buhari assumed office. We now consider what the little money has achieved in a short time versus a huge amount of money earned over long period (1999-2015),” he said.
He justified the reelection bid of President Buhari, saying that he has achieved a lot within a short period of time.
Okechukwu also urged Nigerians to discountenance the predictions that next year’s general elections might violent, saying that a lot of indices point to the contrary.
“The two leading contenders, President Buhari and former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar are both Muslims and Fulanis; so, the issue of ethnic card is cancelled; the issue of religion is also cancelled.
“In a society like ours, we feel that the possibility of crisis is now minimised. So, when we take the religious and ethnic issues out of the way, and the other issue is about their age and both of them are septuagenarian. Nobody can even talk about the young and old; so, three cards have been cancelled”.
He said with these issues out of the way, the main issue of contention is now the fact that President Buhari is bent on battling corruption while the opponents don’t want it”.
