Missed fight between president and ex-president.
Goodluck Jonathan and Buhari threw jabs the way of the other recently. How could you have missed it?
Former President Goodluck Jonathan and his successor Muhammadu Buhari may appear all nice and mushy to themselves before the cameras, but it'd be better not to be fooled.
In there somewhere is a cold war that has been simmering since May 2015.
There have been quite some bitter exchanges between both men if you look hard enough.
Jonathan
has often accused Buhari of going after his family; and the incumbent
president has doubled down on his anti-graft war against former Jonathan
officials—even though that has been labelled a witch-hunt in certain
quarters.
You can be forgiven for missing their latest duel, but we didn’t.
First, let’s begin with Jonathan who made the following comments in Abuja while playing host to a PDP chairmanship aspirant.
Jonathan:
“My
government was severely criticized for increasing the pump price of
petroleum from N67 to N97 at a time that global crude oil price was
going for over 100 dollars.
“The pump
price was later reduced to N87 when the price of crude oil dropped and
they attacked us that it was supposed to be lower.
“Those
who criticized my administration are not talking again now that the
global crude oil price is about 53 dollars per barrel and the pump price
of petrol is N143.
“The PDP administration for 16 years did well and will continue to do well.
“The Buhari administration has done nothing. They deploy propaganda and lies at a professional level.
“In
the power sector, we did well to revive it. A State Governor attacked
our government, saying that any serious government should be able to fix
the power challenge within six months.
“Today, APC has been in power for how many years now? Fortunately, the then Governor is in the APC government as a minister…
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President Buhari responded through his information minister Lai Mohammed, a week later.
Wait for it…..
Buhari:
"For
our Administration, our achievements are there for all to see. We are
delivering in the broad areas that formed the plank of our policies:
security, fight against corruption and the economy, which includes the
massive provision of infrastructure, ease of doing business and
agriculture, just to mention a few.
"Those
who accused this administration of 'propaganda and lies' in the fuel
supply sector, for example, did not tell Nigerians that whereas they
paid between 800 billion and 1.3 trillion Naira as 'subsidy' yearly in
their time, without making the products available even at regulated
prices, this administration is not paying any subsidy, yet all products
are currently available at competitive prices and fuel queues are now
history.
"In their time, they paid subsidy of 3.7 billion
Naira DAILY in 2011; 2.2 billion Naira DAILY in 2012 and 2013, and 2.5
billion Naira DAILY in 2014, all for products that were never available.
"Those
who accused this government of 'propaganda and lies' also said we have
not achieved anything in the power sector. Comment is free, facts are
sacred, as they say. When this administration assumed office on 29 May
2015, available power on the grid totalled 2,690MW, transmission
capacity was around 5,000MW and distribution capacity was 4,000MW.
"As
at 4 September 2017, the available power that can be put on the grid
was 6,619MW; the transmission capacity was simulated at 6,700 MW (up
from 5,000 MW in 2015) but the distribution capacity was 4,600 MW, which
was what was put on the grid. On September 12, 2017, production of
power reached an all-time level of 7,001MW.
It is an irony that those who presided over a
paltry budget, all barely funded, of 18 billion Naira for roads, 5
billion Naira for power and 1.8 billion Naira for Housing in 2015, their
last budget, are now accusing those who spent 198.25 billion Naira on
roads, 91.2 billion Naira on power and 71.559 billion Naira on housing
in the following year of non-achievement?
"In
the area of the Economy, is it 'propaganda and lies' that headline
Inflation has now fallen for the eighth consecutive month (February to
September 2017); that foreign exchange reserves are up to $32 billion,
from $24 billion a year ago: that oil production is at nearly 2 million
barrels per day, a significant improvement from 2016 when it was mostly
below a million; that Home-grown School Feeding Programme is now being
implemented in 17 States, benefiting more than 3 million public primary
school children and more than 30,000 cooks across 20,000 schools (ask
the benefitting school children and they will tell you they have been
eating nutritious foods, not propaganda and lies);
"That close to 200,000 youths are now benefiting
from the N-Power Programme, which recruits unemployed graduates to work
as teachers, agricultural extension workers, and health extension
workers; that the Government Enterprise & Empowerment Programme
(GEEP), which provides micro-credit to farmers, traders, and artisans,
now has in excess of 1 million beneficiaries, with women accounting for
56% of that number, and that at about 1.8 billion dollars, the capital
inflows in the second quarter of 2017 were almost double the $908
million in the first quarter.
"If our
achievements are based on 'propaganda and lies', as they claim, why is
our agricultural revolution achieving so much success: We have
commissioned the 120,000 MT per annum WACOT Rice Mill in Argungu, Kebbi
State. We have commissioned the 60,000 MT per annum Edo State Fertilizer
Company Limited. What about the commissioning of OLAM's 750,000 MT per
annum Integrated Poultry Facility in Kaduna State? Do you know that 15
moribund Fertilizer Blending Plants have now been revived and in
operation across Nigeria, under the Presidential Fertilizer Initiative,
creating 50,000 direct jobs and 70,000 indirect jobs?
"In the area of security, when we assumed office in 2015, Boko Haram
was active in at least 10 states, could stroll into Abuja at a time and
target of their own choosing to cause maximum havoc, in addition to
holding territories and collecting taxes. Today, Boko Haram has been so
degraded that it lacks the capacity to carry out any organized attack,
while also increasingly losing the capacity to even attack soft targets.
Importantly, Boko Haram no longer holds any territory. The same vigour
is being used to address the herdsmen-farmers' clash, kidnapping for
ransom and other crimes.
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