By Kingsley Chukwuka, Jos
The former governor of Plateau State, and former Ambassador to Kenya, Fedelis Tapgun, has described as baseless, President Muhammadu Buhari’s Independence Day speech where he blamed his predecessors for the woes faced in the country.
Describing the President as unserious, Tapgun said Buhari should be thanking God that the country has not divided, adding that, “we are still struggling to remain as one irrespective of everything that has been happening in the country.
“Everybody has been managing the situation to ensure that the disunity amongst us as it is today did not explode beyond what we are already witnessing. But for the President to say that he is better than his predecessors, it means he doesn’t know what he is saying. Nigeria is not only going backwards, but also more divided under Buhari”, he said.
Recall that Buhari has specifically blamed those who were in charge of the country between 1999 and 2015 when he took over, saying they presided over the near destruction of the country.
Former President Olusegun Obasanjo, the late Umar Yar’Adua and former President Goodluck Jonathan were in charge of the country during the period Buhari mentioned.
“In the past five years I can’t tell you this is what Buhari has done. Obasanjo created ICPC, EFCC, and NSCDC, all to fight corruption and create jobs. Can Buhari show us one thing he created? Tapgun quarried.
Tapgun, a former Minister of Industry under President Obasanjo, also faulted Buhari for comparing Nigeria’s pump price with Saudi Arabia, saying government should only do what is good for the country and stop comparing Nigeria with other countries.
“Saudi Arabia produce oil and place the welfare of their citizens as their number one priority. Saudi citizens receives salaries whether they work or not. They live in luxury”, Tapgun said.
Also recall that the President in his nationwide broadcast gave an indication of further hikes in the price of petrol, saying it made no sense for the commodity to be cheaper in Nigeria than in Saudi Arabia.
“Petroleum prices in Nigeria are to be adjusted. We sell now at N161 per litre”, Buhari said.
When asked if Buhari was doing a good job fighting corruption, the former Ambassador to Kenya said the President’s fight against corruption is deceptive.
“In fact corruption is even encouraged from what we can see. The reason why we voted Buhari was for him to fight corruption, but since he took over office, instead of corruption to go down, it is rather escalating. If you are accused of stealing money in PDP, as soon as you jump over to APC, your sins are forgiven”, the former minister argued.
On the country’s 60th Independence amidst hunger, high rate of foodstuffs, increase in electricity tariff and pump price, Tapgun said it is a shame that at 60 the nation is still crawling.
“Someone rang me to say Nigeria is 60, I responded by saying, so at 60 we are still crawling and have not started walking?”