Former Nigeria’s President, Dr Goodluck Jonathan said Nigeria under President Muhammadu has not made progress in the Corruption Perception Index of Transparency International since it assumed power in 2015.
This, Jonathan said, was due to his failure to fire, arrest or prosecute some of the administration cronies and friends within the government who have been accused of corrupt practices.
The former President, who was reacting to a statement credited to the Director General of Voice of Nigeria (VON), Mr. Osita Okechukwu, stated: “The last time Nigeria made progress on Transparency International’s annual Corruption Perception Index was in 2014 under former President Jonathan.
Okechukwu had said that the former president encouraged looting in reaction to his August 12 National Convention speech where he claimed that PDP government had performed better than the APC government”.
Speaking through his former Special Adviser on Social Media, Reno Omokri, Jonathan said when he was in office, “Nigeria moved eight places from number 144 to number 136 in the Transparency International Corruption Perception Index in 2014.”
The former Jonathan’s aide urged the VON Director General to stick to facts and not to pull wool over the eyes of TI for failing fire the Minister of Transport who admittedly spend $500,000 on a one day dinner for Professor Wole Soyinka.
He also said the APC government had failed to sack suspended Secretary to the Government of the Federation, who was caught “red handed” looting funds meant for IDPs and who has not been fired, arrested or prosecuted.
He said with a padded budget scandal that spends borrowed monies on luxuries for favored individuals, Okechukwu cannot pull the wool over the eyes of Transparency International.
Omokri wrote: “My attention has been drawn to the statement by President Muhammadu Buhari’s former spokesman, Mr Osita Okechukwu, now the Director General of Voice of Nigeria (VON), who has said that rather than plug the loopholes that allowed for corruption, former President Goodluck Jonathan opened them up further, contrary to his speech at the non elective convention of the Official Peoples Democratic Party, which held this past weekend.
“Okechukwu also said that ex-president Jonathan and his party “railroaded” Nigerians into “abject poverty, food insecurity and deficit infrastructure” via “planlessness and squandermania”.
“I would advise Okechukwu, to stick to facts.
