• PRP chairman says insecurity, starvation worsening
•Faults financial reforms, argues powerful selections hurting Nigerians
Emmanuel Addeh in Abuja
The National Chairman of the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP), Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, yesterday described President Bola Tinubu as a failure, arguing that worsening insecurity and financial hardship have left the administration with little to present Nigerians forward of the 2027 common election.
Baba-Ahmed, who spoke on Channels Television’s Politics Today, additionally questioned Tinubu’s reported plan to restrict his marketing campaign appearances, insisting that the president ought to personally meet Nigerians to clarify his insurance policies and the hardship they’ve endured since he assumed workplace in May 2023.
“Tinubu inherited Nigeria, but what has he done with it? He inherited a poor country; he inherited weak institutions; he inherited poverty and insecurity. We don’t blame him, but he’s been in power for three and a half years. He is a failure,” he stated.
The PRP chairman challenged the president to clarify why Nigerians had been experiencing larger hardship regardless of the administration’s financial reforms and repeated claims of progress, arguing that the consequences of presidency insurance policies on peculiar residents couldn’t be dismissed with financial statistics.
“Why doesn’t Tinubu commit himself to say, I will. I have the energy, I have the intention, I want to see Nigerians, I want Nigerians to see me, I want them to hear me explain why they are more hungry,” Baba-Ahmed stated.
Asked concerning the president’s reported intention to marketing campaign in solely a few areas, he replied: “Yes, he has nothing to say to them, I’m telling you, he has nothing to say to Nigerians.”
He additional questioned the administration’s determination to go away marketing campaign actions to its representatives, saying the president couldn’t justify staying in Abuja to govern when, in his view, the federal government had failed to handle the nation’s challenges over the previous three and a half years.
“The reason why he said, go, gentlemen, go and campaign for me. I will stay here in Abuja and run the country. You’re running the country now? For three and a half years, you didn’t run the country, now you remember that you are here to run the country?” he stated.
Baba-Ahmed additionally criticised the administration’s financial insurance policies, arguing that troublesome selections weren’t essentially good selections, significantly when their instant penalties included increased dwelling prices and deeper poverty.
“He (Tinubu) made some tough decisions but they were anti-people decisions, a tough decision doesn’t have to be a good decision,” he stated.
He questioned the attain and effectiveness of the federal government’s intervention programmes, significantly loans, in opposition to the backdrop of kids unable to attend college due to insecurity in elements of the nation.
“You talk about creating loans, that’s good, but do you know how many millions of children that can’t go to school under Tinubu’s watch in this country? Children who live in territories taken over by bandits, kidnappers, and who can’t go to school at all?” he requested.
On safety, the PRP chairman alleged that the state of affairs had deteriorated below the present administration, whereas dismissing the federal government’s presentation of financial indicators as insufficient proof that Nigerians had been higher off.
“Security has gotten considerably worse, it has never been worse like this. All these things you mentioned, this is the propaganda. Unfortunately, for Tinubu, Nigerians are not going to buy it. Children are not going to school, life is more insecure, life is harder,” he added.
Baba-Ahmed argued that the president’s enchantment for an additional four-year time period would relaxation on a promise that present financial difficulties would ultimately ease, somewhat than an admission that the reforms had already improved dwelling situations.
He additionally questioned the sequencing of the insurance policies, saying the federal government ought to have thought of their instant results on households earlier than implementation.
“A thinking president will say let me do one or two things first, because I will impoverish people and the cost of transportation is vital and central to everything,” he stated.
Also, Baba-Ahmed stated Nigeria had failed to study the required classes from the #EndSARS protests, six years after younger folks took to the streets in 2020 to demand an finish to police brutality and higher governance.
He argued that disbanding the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) had not resolved the underlying issues of police misconduct, lack of accountability and poor governance.
According to him, the judicial panels established after the protests raised expectations that these liable for abuses could be held accountable and victims compensated, however their suggestions had not been absolutely carried out.
He cited the usage of tear gasoline in opposition to youths marking the sixth anniversary of the protests on the Lekki Toll Gate in Lagos yesterday as proof, in his view, that little had modified.
“We have not shown our young people that protesting for good governance is not a crime. Until justice is served for those who died at Lekki and compensation is paid, the wound will remain,” Baba-Ahmed stated.
