Presidency replies PDP, defends Buhari’s visit to Lagos

The Presidency has risen in defence of the visit of President Muhammadu Buhari to Lagos State on December 9 to launch a made-in-Nigeria naval defence ship, Oji, and inducted other vital military assets meant to improve the country’s capability to fight increased piracy in the Gulf of Guinea.

A spokesman for the President, Garba Shehu, in a statement on Monday night, was reacting to the critics and the People’s Democratic Party, which faulted the trip that Buhari used the visit to attend the launch of the book written by the first interim National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress, Bisi Akande.

He said, “But, of course, those in the PDP who have nothing positive or new to add to the debate about the future of the nation seek to trivialise the President’s Lagos visit: they choose to ignore the crucial launch of the naval vessels; they suggest the primary reason for going to Lagos was to attend a book launch.

“They try to make further mileage by claiming the President should not have attended given the attack by bandits elsewhere in the country that same day.

“Should the president not have launched the naval ships the day after that attack?

“Should he listen to the PDP who feign concern for those affected by banditry when they did nothing to combat it for decades – not on land or at sea? Should our famously austere President not attend a book launch of his friend and fellow democratic opposition veteran when it coincided with a visit to Lagos to tend the affairs of state?

“Through their attacks, the PDP reveal their priorities. Of course, for decades, as the PDP enjoyed their decadent parties at others’ expense, the navy and the armed forces rotted through negligence.”

“Sadly, these opportunistic opposition elements, in a desperate search for political points, have dragged respected religious leaders into the discussion, feeding them misleading information who have in turn used this distorted picture to blackpaint the President in the eyes of gullible and innocent members of the public.”