It is touching when an average Nigerian complains about the change we asked for. Nigerians shouldn’t behave like the devil who thinks that he is better than human beings, simply because he was created from fire. And we should try to appreciate Almighty God that made the change possible, when some people thought it was impossible. Almighty God knows better than we do. For this we have to be grateful to Him always.
It is a pity that we easily forget what we passed through in the hands of the previous government on the issues of security and corruption. Money meant to secure Nigerian citizens was diverted to personal pockets while the people were being killing by Boko Haram. Money was wasted in pursuit of personal interest called National Conference.
We recall the 18-page memo written by former President Olusegun Obasanjo to Nigerians and HIS warning to former President Goodluck Jonathan about the economy, after series of advice he gave him.
I would give you some areas were this government has performed better than the previous government; Buhari’s administration was able to reduce the rate of corruption in the Nigeria.
The budget padding that was used to siphone money from the government coffers was discovered and the perpetrators will be prosecuted. While the previous administration took looting of public treasury as a business and a normal thing, the Buhari government has recovered billions from treasury looters and plugged all the leakages of government finances.
The corrupt individuals and organizations are being sent to prison, while the previous government allowed looters to enjoy their loot.
The Boko Haram insurgency is now a thing of the past while the last government harbored them in its cabinet. The present government is working hard to develop critical infrastructure, while the previous one always apologised to Nigerians because they failed to provide infrastructure to the masses, but were busy developing individual pockets by award of contract to the party loyalists which were never executed.
During the Jonathan administration, the National Assembly members were bribed to inflate the budget of ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) to the detriment of the masses. Buhari’s administration has been able to stop this waste for the benefit of masses.
The administration has proved that nobody is above the law – military looters, politicians, ministers, governors, etc are now in prison but during the last regime they could not try it.
This regime is fighting hard to end insurgency and militancy with modern equipment or weapons to fight those enemies.
Jonathan’s government made money by selling crude oil at $140 per barrel and nothing to show for it, because they shared the money by awarding fake contracts to their members and they cannot pay salary to federal civil servants. Now the crude oil is only 40 dollars per barrel and federal civil servants are not being owed.
The previous administration wasted Nigeria’s resources by enriching individual’s pockets to the detriment of the masses, when they spent billions of naira on National Conference, and awarding contracts without supervising them. They always believed in enriching their members to rig elections so that they would remain in power. For instance, N11 billion contract was awarded for Kaduna, Kawo to Lord Luggard Roundabout expansion, and the contractor commenced work a month to the election because they believed that they would lose the election to an opposition. After the election and a new governor was sworn-in and about N1.2 billion was recovered from the contractor after renegotiating of the contract.
The previous administration shouldn’t deceive Nigerians, because they are the cause of this economic recession, since they failed to invest against the rainy day. They embarked on unnecessary projects that have no benefits to the Nigerian masses. I want to use this opportunity to appeal to those on the ruling party to make their input for the progress of the party and Nigerians as a whole.
The minister of information talks about the recession problem facing the country, where he said: “We have a very defective economic structure, which depended largely on a single platform of crude and fuel.
“Crude oil accounts for between eight and 12 per cent of our GDP and another 53 per cent of the GDP which we call non-oil, unfortunately also depend on the same oil. When the price of oil now crashes in the international market, definitely you are bound to have this kind of shock in the economy.”
“He decried the citizens’ preference for imported goods to local products, saying that substantial amounts of the country’s foreign exchange earnings were being spent on importation of goods and services. He also blamed past administrations’ inability to achieve massive investment on infrastructure to assist manufacturing industries and boost agriculture production as part of current problem.”
The opposition party like Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), I have never seen it as a party but a society or cult that only considers its members before the masses that voted for them. Look at how they looted the treasury, the previous administration can’t tell us that they have left any money in the treasury. How? With left over, they went ahead to borrow money to pay salaries, for Boko Haram insurgency and shared the loan for campaign in the last election in the name of Boko Haram.
The ‘Change’ slogan is consistent, while the ‘Fresh Air’ turned to ‘Transformation Agenda’ after the election that could not make impact. A word is enough for the wise.
God bless President Buhari,
God bless the Federal Republic of Nigeria,
Raji Saidu Onipson, Mando, Kaduna
