The FG has said that Atiku, who is the candidate of Obasanjo, would be
roundly and comprehensively defeated by President Muhammadu Buhari.
The Federal
Government has reacted to the claim by former President Olusegun
Obasanjo that he will support his former deputy, Atiku Abubakar, in the
2019 presidential election.
The Federal Government said the former President “has every right
to support anyone he likes,” adding that such a right “is
constitutional.”
However, it said the support would not save Atiku and his party, the Peoples Democratic Party, from defeat.
It said Atiku, who is the candidate of Obasanjo, would be “roundly and comprehensively” defeated by President Muhammadu Buhari.
Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, stated these at a media briefing in Abuja on Monday.
He said that President Muhammadu Buhari had done well since he
assumed office in 2015, regretting that Obasanjo might have been reading
what he called “wrong reports about the activities of the Buhari
government” (that made him to take the decision to support Atiku.)
Mohammed said,“ If Obasanjo said we are not doing well, it is
probably he is not reading the right reports. Everyone has the right to
decide who to support. Three and a half years is too short for any
government to do everything for everybody.“I’m always sceptical to respond to former heads of state,
especially somebody like former President Obasanjo. On corruption, this
government has done a lot to combat it.“We have put in place many ways to stop corruption. We were not
the one that initiated the Treasury Single Account, but we have the
political will to implement it.”
He said the Federal Government had recovered billions of naira from
allegedly corrupt individuals and also seized about 295 vehicles and
407 mansions.
The Federal Government, he said, had also saved about N17bn from
travels and gifts that could have been given out to people by government
officials.
Mohammed said the former President should know ‘the number of
megawatts of electricity he left while leaving office compared to more
than 7,000 (megawatts) that “we have now.”
He also accused the opposition of manufacturing fake news to
discredit the Buhari Presidency. For example, he said three items of
fake news had been ascribed to him of recent.
According to him, one of such was that he said Nigeria would attack
Israel with missiles if the country would not deport the wanted leader
of the Indigenous Peoples of Biafra, Mr Nnamdi Kanu.
He said it was also alleged that Buhari could no longer speak
Fulfude as a result of the surgery the President had while on a sick bed
in the United Kingdom.
The minister said, “We have it on record that the opposition is
already jittery of Buhari’s imminent victory and has consequently
resorted to using fake news to blackmail the President and our party in
order to give excuse for the looming defeat.“One of the items of the fake news being propagated by the
opposition, which is now very confused, is that Buhari cannot speak
Fulfulde, his mother tongue and cannot open the main door to his
conference room in the Presidential Villa, having undergone cloning,
despite having openly been made clear that there was nothing like that.“This is clearly the fake news and the handiwork of the opposition in serious distress and confusion.”
The minister also said that it would be wrong to blame the President for refusing to sign the amended Electoral Bill.
He, therefore, appealed to Nigerians to accept the reasons given by
the President for not assenting to the bill, adding that the President
took the action in the interest of the nation.
He said the President would wait for the action to be taken by the
National Assembly on the rejected bill, but said that the reason why
President did not sign was not because of fear that he could be
defeated.
The minister said, “The Presidency would await the decision on the bill before commenting further.
“We believe Mr President has the prerogative to do what he has
done by rejecting assent to the electoral bill. Each arm of government
must guard jealously its independence.“Let us wait for the National Assembly’s next line of action on
the electoral bill, but it is not correct to say the President refused
to sign for fear of being defeated as being alleged by the opposition.”
On whether Nigerians should look ahead to see the President
engaging Atiku in a presidential debate, the minister said that only the
President could decide whether he would take part in a debate or not.
Nevertheless, he said there was no law that compelled the President
to take part in debates, saying his ministers had already been doing
that for him and his government.
“He (President Buhari ) has a cabinet, and every member of the
cabinet goes out to tell Nigerians what has been done under this
government. That is debate. I do that often and that is what I’m doing
now,” he added.
The minister also defended the disbursement of billions of naira by
the Federal Government to Nigerian traders under the Trademoni scheme,
which the main opposition party, the PDP, had described as “advance
vote-buying.”
The minister insisted that the money being given to the traders was
part of a larger policy of the administration under the Social
Investment Programme, which is given to all Nigerians irrespective of
political leanings.
He said, “It didn’t start today. We have N-Power, under which
we have employed more than one million people; we feed about nine
million pupils and we also have cash transfers to about 297, 000 poor
families .“What we are doing is not vote-buying but poverty alleviation.
It wasn’t meant to buy votes. The PDP is already jittery and preparing
grounds and reasons for its defeat.”Buhari regretting Obasanjo’s desertion – PDP
In its reaction, the PDP said it was apparent that the President
and the APC were already regretting that Obasanjo had withdrawn his
support for them.
It said both Buhari and his party were full of praises for the former President when he was leading their campaign in 2015.
National Chairman of the PDP, Prince Uche Secondus, who spoke with
one of our correspondents, said the President and the APC in 2015
described Obasanjo as their navigator.
He said, “This is what we have been saying. This is a
government of use and dump. They have no memories. When they put on
their uniforms and went to beg Baba at Abeokuta shortly before the last
election, they were happy to have his support.“Now that they have disappointed the former President and the majority of Nigerians, they don’t care about his support anymore.“This is a government that doesn’t rely on the vote of the people. They want to rig, but Nigerians will reject them.”
Secondus also said that the PDP during its campaigns, would expose
the method which he alleged the ruling party was relying on to win the
elections.
On his part, the Director-General of the Voice of Nigeria, Osita
Okechukwu, said the 2019 general election would be a battle for
Nigeria’s soul.
Okechukwu spoke while receiving members of the Buhari National Student Support Group in his office, on Monday.
In response to allegations of incompetence levelled against the
Buhari All Progressives Congress administration by former President
Olusegun Obasanjo, the VON DG said, “It is because there has not been an investigation into how Obasanjo suddenly became wealthy.“If questions were asked about how a man who in 1998 was
brought out of prison and asked to contest the Presidency and he said he
didn’t have money and today, he is the owner of several business
concerns, including Bells University, perhaps, Nigeria would be the
better for it.”Buhari can’t match Atiku in character, integrity, PDP tells APC
The Peoples Democratic Party Presidential Campaign Organisation on
Monday told the All Progressives Congress that President Muhammadu
Buhari could not be a match to its Presidential candidate, Atiku
Abubakar, in character, integrity, competence and public acceptance.
The campaign council was reacting to a claim by the APC that the
presidential campaign could be based on the character and integrity of
the two main contenders for the 2019 presidential election.
Recall that the APC said that it would flaunt the purported integrity of the President which it described as unblemished.
However, the PDP Secretary, who is also the spokesperson for the
presidential campaign council, Mr Kola Ologbondiyan, stated that the
APC, in raising the issue of personal character of candidates, had
unwittingly sunk President Buhari’s campaign by opening a flank that
ultimately exposed him to public opprobrium.
He said, “Inasmuch as the PDP is committed to issue-based
campaign and finding solutions to the myriad of problems the
incompetent, divisive and extremely corrupt Buhari administration has
plunged our nation into, our party is ready and will not hesitate to
take on the APC, any time, any day on issues of personal character and
integrity, which President Buhari is in clear deficit before Atiku.‘’It is on record that nothing incriminatory has ever been
found on Atiku, despite being the most investigated politician in our
country, particularly by the Buhari Presidency; but can such be said of
President Buhari, who has been jittery over Atiku’s soaring popularity
and acceptance across the board, ahead of the 2019 general election?”
He added, “In the interim, between President Buhari and Atiku,
Nigerians know the leader, who is bugged by integrity issues and under
whose watch our Presidency became ‘fantastically corrupt’, with issues
of certificate forgery and allegations of sundry frauds in which family
members and close relatives are being mentioned.“Nigerians are aware of the leader under whose direct watch,
over N11tn has been stolen from our petroleum sector and billions of
naira frittered away from our National Health Insurance Fund and other
revenue agencies in the last three and a half years.“They are aware of the leader who has reneged in all his
campaign promises; who stays aloof always to the plight of the people
and only parades as pro-poor, just to win their votes.”
On the issue of achievement, Ologbondiyan said,”The world knows
the Nigerian leader whose corrupt administration plunged the nation
into economic recession and who cannot point to any development project
he initiated and completed in any part of the country or any personal
contribution he has made to the development of our nation, either in
office or as a private citizen.“The APC has raised the issue of character; it should be ready to face the debate when the heat is on.”
Share your thoughts