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“Why did the presidency do nothing as the Attorney General of the Federation, went to court to secure a kangaroo court order…?”
• Ex-VP dismisses Buhari’s transparency claim
• You can’t compare apples, oranges, replies presidential aide
Sunday Ani
The Presidency and former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, are locked in a fight over President Muhammadu Buhari’s anti-corruption crusade.
READ ALSO: Buhari warns Atiku
Atiku, yesterday, urged the president to have a clear grasp of the 1999 Constitution as this would enable him understand that the rule of law and the fundamental human rights of all Nigerian citizens, are guaranteed by that document, which he swore to uphold on May 29, 2015.
In a statement signed by his media aide, Paul Ibem the former vice president maintained his earlier stance that the president is power-drunk.
“On the issue of being power-drunk, president Buhari is his own witness against himself. It goes without saying that a president, who publicly boasted that the rule of law can be suppressed against certain individuals is not only power drunk, but dictatorial.
“By that statement ,made by president Buhari at the opening ceremony of the 58th Annual General Conference of the Nigerian Bar Association, Nigerians now understand why this administration continues to flout court orders. This is what happens when a president thinks he is above the law.”
Atiku said he felt amused by the presidency’s response to an interview he granted to Bloomberg, where the president’s spokesmen said Buhari is uncompromising in the quest to restore probity and accountability to public office.
Atiku picked holes in the presidency’s response.
“Why did the presidency do nothing as the Attorney General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami, went to court to secure a kangaroo court order to stop the Senate of the National Assembly from investigating who recalled, reinstated and double promoted Abdulrasheed Maina?
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“If President Buhari is ‘uncompromising in cleaning the rot Nigeria was consigned into pre-2015,’ then how come the latest corruption perception index by Transparency International reveals that Nigeria is more corrupt today than she was in 2015, having moved 12 steps backwards in Transparency International’s corruption perception index, moving from 136 in 2014 under the PDP to 148 today?
“Again, we ask, how uncompromising a president can be when he allows a minister accused of forgery to remain at her job?
“It appears that the president is surrounded by people who have become his echo chamber and are telling him what he wants to hear, otherwise, no one in his right mind would call an administration that increased the price of petrol while at the same time paying more subsidy on the product than the previous government which it accused of ‘subsidy scam’, uncompromising against corruption.”
Still, Atiku pressed further. He added: “It is only common sense that if the price of petrol increased by 68 percent, from 87 per litre to N145, then, the cost of fuel subsidy should also reduce, especially as the price of crude oil also reduced.
“However, by some strange mathematics, the Buhari administration pays a whopping N1.4 trillion on subsidy, per annum, according to the Minister of State for Petroleum (Resources).
“This amount is almost twice what the (former President Goodluck) Jonathan administration paid and yet president Buhari accused that administration of scamming the nation.”
READ ALSO: 2019: Jonathan says PDP’s primary election will be free, fair
The former vice president also questioned the presidency’s integrity and transparency tag, when he asked: “Where is the transparency in that?
“No wonder the minister of state for Petroleum Resources revealed in a leaked memo that $25 billion worth of contracts were awarded by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation; under the watch of the supervising Minister of Petroleum Resources, President Muhammadu Buhari.
“More than a year after the probe panel, which probed the fantastically corrupt Ikoyi apartment billions affair, nobody knows who owned the money and how $43 million, in cash, was housed in a government linked flat.
“So much for an uncompromising attitude to corruption.”
Regardless, Buhari’s Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, simply replied Atiku: “Nigerians know the truth. They never compare apples with oranges.”
