Frank Faults Buhari’s Nomination of Ex-Service Chiefs as Envoys

Frank Faults Buhari’s Nomination of Ex-Service Chiefs as Envoys
  • Urges Senate to reject the nominees

By Udora Orizu

A former Deputy National Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Timi Frank, has faulted the nomination of the nation’s former service chiefs for appointment as non-career ambassadors by President Muhammadu Buhari.

He has, therefore, advised the Senate to consider the national interest and refuse to confirm the nominees.

President Buhari had on Thursday announced Gen. Abayomi Olonisakin (rtd), Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai (rtd), Vice Admiral Ibok-Ete Ibas (rtd), Air Marshal Sadique Abubakar (rtd), and Air Vice Marshal Mohammed Usman (rtd) as Ambassadorial-nominees.

Frank, in a statement on Friday in Abuja, said Buhari’s action was tantamount to rewarding incompetence at the nation’s expense, global image and perception.

According to him, the nomination of the former service chiefs as envoys by Buhari is meant to dress them in diplomatic immunity in order to shield them from investigation and prosecution by the International Criminal Court (ICC) already probing the varied atrocities and crimes against humanity the ex-service chiefs may have individually or collectively perpetrated while in office.

Frank noted that the #LekkiMassacre during the #EndSARSs protests, where scores of innocent Nigerian youths who were protesting peacefully against police brutality, were shot and killed by soldiers is of recent memory.

While appealing to the Senate to put national interest and pride first by rejecting the nominees, he also called on members of the international community, particularly the countries where the ex-service chiefs may be posted to as envoys to reject them.

The activist also vowed to mobilise Nigerians in diaspora to stage protests in countries of their primary assignment should the ex-service chiefs ever be posted as diplomats by Buhari.

Frank said: “The nomination of these ex-service chiefs to represent Nigeria in foreign countries is an international embarrassment and a new low for the country’s image.

“The world has gone past the era where former military chiefs can be considered fit and proper persons to represent a democratic country in the conduct of high-wired diplomatic business. Buhari has clearly got this wrong. He erroneously believes that his administration is a military junta.”

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