Nigerians no longer fools, Timi Frank tells Buhari

Former Deputy National Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Comrade Timi Frank, on Friday, warned President Muhammadu Buhari that Nigerians are no longer fools, and therefore shouldn’t attempt to pull wool over their faces.

Timi Frank disclosed this while reacting to the Independence Day speech delivered by President Buhari to mark Nigeria’s 61^st independence anniversary on Friday.

He described the speech to Nigerians as a message “filled with 61 per cent lies, half-truths and blatant inaccuracies.”

Frank who is the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) Ambassador to East Africa and Middle East, in a statement in Abuja, lamented that Buhari chose to rewrite history by twisting facts which are already well known by Nigerians in order to further deceive the people.

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He noted that even though the calamities that have befallen the country since 2015 are a direct result of Buhari’s nepotism, divisiveness and ethnic bigotry, the President attempted to pull wool over the faces of Nigerians.

He insisted that the country which had been on a steady growth and development since 1960, through the spirited efforts of successive administrations, did not only stall since 2015 upon Buhari’s ascension to power  but has continued to retrogress irretrievably in all measurable economic, social and political indices.

“First Buhari praised the Armed Forces for their gallantry in curtailing the murderous activities of Boko Haram insurgents, Fulani herdsmen, bandits and other criminal elements, yet, this is the same military that have failed to stop incessant attacks on their formations, killing of its personnel and kidnapping of its Generals across the country.

“The attack on the Nigerian Defence Academy, killing of two officers and kidnap of Major Christopher Datong is a case in point. Thanks to Major Datong’s colleagues who secretly paid ransom to bandits to secure his release.

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“The nation’s currency exchanged for about N180 to a dollar when Buhari took over power, but his administration created multiple foreign exchange rate windows through which dubious officials siphoned the nation’s treasury without repercussion. What is the exchange rate today? About N567 to a dollar at the parallel market and N410 at the official window!

“Nigeria was the fastest growing economy in Africa following the rebasing of the nation’s economy under President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration. Today, Nigeria is the Poverty Capital of the World. However, Buhari would want the world to believe that his regime has recorded appreciable economic revival in the country.

“Today Buhari and his administration have turned a once peaceful South East region bubbling with commercial activities to another haven of insurgency and gruesome killings due to the cluelessness with which it handled legitimate protests and agitations by youths in that region.

According to him, President Buhari has uncovered the financiers of secessionist movements in the South East and South West, but because of nepotism, he failed to name the sponsors of Boko Haram and bandits in the North even when the United Arab Emirates has since named the financiers of these dreaded groups.

“For Buhari, it is easy to name a Federal Lawmaker as a financier of secessionist agitation in the South East, but not easy to identify Boko Haram sponsors in the North. What manner of ethnic chauvinism!