…Says former President lied to garner southeast votes

…Obasanjo administration dark days for Nigeria

The Presidency, on Monday, said former President Olusegun Obasanjo is verbally attacking the Buhari regime “out of frustration.”

It also described Obasanjo’s attitude to the President as “vengeful”.

“‘Hell’ for Obasanjo is when a President, any President that comes after him refuses to be his own puppet, to do as he wishes on all matters and at all times. 

“He then keeps attacking out of frustration. Obasanjo’s vengeful attitude towards President Buhari is the height of selfishness and little short of moral squalor,” the Presidency said in a statement signed by Buhari’s Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu.

The statement is titled Morally squalid Obasanjo attacks leaders out of frustration.

Shehu’s statement comes barely 24 hours after Obasanjo described the Buhari-led government as “hell on earth” for Nigerians.

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In his new year message, the former President said under Buhari, “Nigeria of today had been dragged down well below Nigeria of the beginning of my Presidency in June 1999.”

While formally endorsing the Presidential candidate of the Labour Party, Mr Peter Obi for the February 25 election, Obasanjo also urged young Nigerians to ride on the next elections and take their destiny into their hands.

But in its reaction, the Presidency argued that Obasanjo lacked the adequate moral authority to berate the Buhari regime on four grounds.

“President Buhari is ahead of Chief Obasanjo in all fields of national development and to do that is a cardinal sin to Obasanjo whose hallucinations tell him that he is the best ever to lead Nigeria and there will never be another one better than him.

“President Buhari just completed the world-class edifice that is the Second Niger Bridge after three decades of failed promises. It is now awaiting commissioning. Obasanjo laid the sod for the bridge in his first term as elected President and work never started.

“When he sought re-election for his second term in office, he returned to the site to turn the sod for the bridge the second time. When the Obi of Onitsha, forthright and scholarly, reminded him that he had done this in the past, Obasanjo told the foremost Southeast traditional ruler that he was a liar, in the full presence of the Chiefs and Oracles in his palace.

“Obasanjo lied to the Southeast to get their votes. President Buhari didn’t get their votes but built the bridge because he believed it is the right thing to do,” the statement read in part.

Second, the Presidency said Buhari has been stating and restating that he will supervise a better election than the one that brought him to the office and to leave as and when due.

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It explained that “Having tried tenure elongation and failed, Obasanjo’s fictitious mind must be telling him that he is the one under attack.

“But he is not on President Buhari’s radar because experience has shown, especially lately in West Africa where there have been at least three successful coups and many other failed attempts, that third term or tenure elongation is a recipe for political instability. 

“Furthermore, the totality of African leaders appointed President Buhari the Anti-Corruption Champion of the continent.

“You can’t be an anti-corruption champion if ‘you meddled and bent the rules,’ carrying the putrid responsibility of what happened to national assets in the name of privatization as documented by the Nigerian Senate in 2011.”

Shehu cited several national assets such as Aluminum Smelter Company of Nigeria which was set up with $3.2bn and sold to a Russian firm, Russal, for $130m; Delta Steel, which was set up in 2005, at a cost of $1.5bn, was sold to Global Infrastructure for $30m. 

He also noted that ALSCON got back $120m for the dredging of the Imo River, which was never carried out.

Third, the Shehu said Buhari’s rising profile as the Champion of Democracy at home, in West Africa and Africa-wide, must be unsettling for Obasanjo who “destabilised internal democracy by orchestrating impeachment after impeachment of governors who were not compliant with his highly imperial administration.”

“As we said sometime back, Mr Obasanjo’s tenure, 1999-2007, represented the dark days of Nigeria’s democracy due to a slew of assaults on the constitution.

“The former president deployed federal machinery to remove governors Joshua Dariye, Rashidi Ladoja, Peter Obi, Chris Ngige and Ayo Fayose from office.

“They were the then governors of Plateau, Oyo, Anambra, Anambra and Ekiti, respectively, unjustly removed using the police and secret service under his control,” Shehu argued.

It said under the Peoples Democratic Party, lawmaking powers of the Rivers State legislature were transferred to the federal parliament to punish Governor Amaechi for shifting his political alliance.

By contrast, the Presidency said “In Washington a few weeks ago, the US President Joe Biden at a meeting with African Heads of States and Government described President Buhari as a champion of democracy and role model for the leaders of African states.

Punch