The All Progressives Congress, APC, presidential candidate,
Bola Ahmed Tinubu, has accused his Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, counterpart,
Atiku Abubakar of lying in his recent interview.
Recall that Atiku, former Nigerian Vice President who was
featured on Arise TV on Friday, spoke on several issues bedeviling the nation
particularly in regards to the forthcoming presidential elections.
Atiku had during the TV programme, alleged that he declined
Tinubu’s move to be his running mate in 2007 over the same faith ticket.
He asserted that when he got the presidential ticket of the
Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN, in 2007, Tinubu, one of the founders of the
party, insisted to be his running mate but he declined in a bid to avoid having
a Muslim-Muslim ticket.
Atiku further opined that his stand against the
Muslim-Muslim ticket formed the fundamental disagreement between him and
Asiwaju from 2007 till date.
However, a statement issued on Saturday by the Director,
Media & Communication, Tinubu Campaign Organisation, Bayo Onanuga, said
Atiku’s response to questions during the interview indicated that he is not
ready for the job.
The statement pointed out six areas the PDP candidate
allegedly lied.
Full statement reads:
Mr Presidential candidate: Lincoln did not contest US
Presidency five or six times, Takeaways from Atiku Abubakar bungled interview
on ARISE Television
We have watched Alhaji Atiku Abubakar’s interview on ARISE
Television and were extremely shocked by the many lies and ignorance displayed
by the Peoples Democratic Party’s presidential candidate.
“In the interview, Alhaji Atiku exposed himself as a man who
is not prepared for the job he is applying for and a man who can not be
entrusted with our commonwealth. He was flippant in his response to important
questions about his record of service and how he made money while serving in
Customs. He muddled up facts and exhibited befuddling absence of mind.
“Here are our takeaways from the bungled interview:
1. PDP candidate is a law breaker: It was most shocking
Atiku admitted that he cheated the system for decades and engaged in gross
misconduct as a government worker. As a customs officer at the Idi-Iroko
border, Atiku revealed that he ran a commercial taxi service, claiming ‘there
is no law stopping public officers from doing business in Nigeria”. He punched
harder, claiming there is no conflict of interest in doing so.
We found this to be untrue.
Every officer in the civil service is expected to comply
with a code of conduct and service rules which bar civil and public servants
from engaging in private business while in government employment to the
detriment of the service he/she is employed to render to the public. The 1999
constitution further codifies this in Part I, Fifth Schedule, Section of 2 (b).
It says a public officer shall not, except where he is not
employed on full-time basis engage or participate in the management or running
of any private business, profession or trade. The rules however allow a public
officer to engage in farming.
We wonder which rule or which law Atiku was relying upon for
his gross misconduct as a public officer. It is our considered view that Atiku
gamed the system all through his career in public service, culminating in his
founding of the Intel Logistics along with Late Shehu Yar’Adua and some
Italians, even while he was still in the employment of the Nigeria Customs
Service.
2. Poor Knowledge of key sectors of the economy: We also
found it surprising that the PDP presidential candidate does not know the
contribution of the oil and gas industry to Nigeria’s GDP. He claimed the
sector represents 20% of our national GDP whereas it is below 10 percent and it
is still falling owing to the growth of the non-oil sector under the current
All Progressives Congress led administration of President Muhammadu Buhari.
3. False Data from Egypt: Atiku Abubakar wanted to impress
his audience with his supposed knowledge of international affairs. He ended up
embarrassing himself with false data he cited from Egypt. We found his claim
that Egypt has 2 million police officers on the streets to be untrue. Various
sources put the number at about 500,000 for a population of 104 million and not
80 million as falsely claimed by Atiku.
4. Rotational Presidency: Asked to justify why the PDP
jettisoned Section 3c of its own constitution which enshrines power rotation
between the North and South, Atiku tried to fudge his answer by focussing on
Governor Nyesom Wike and his effort to reconcile with him after he, a
northerner snatched the presidential ticket that ought to have been taken by a
southerner. While Atiku was playing to the gallery on APC’s Muslim-Muslim
presidential ticket, he didn’t see seeking to be President after 8years of a
President from his part of Nigeria as politics of exclusion.
Probed further, Atiku provided several contradictory
answers. In one breath, he said power rotation is not in the constitution. In
another breath, he said the PDP has never “micro zoned any position’. Then he
admitted that the party has always rotated power between the North and the
South. Atiku’s justification as to why he became PDP’s presidential candidate,
instead of a southerner is a perfect example in ellipsis: “In politics”, he
said, “we negotiate power through negotiations(Sic)”. Whatever that means.
Atiku, ever an expert in not telling the truth also did not
come clean over his once-upon a time preference for same-faith ticket. In 1993,
after Atiku and Kingibe lost to MKO Abiola in the SDP presidential primary in
Jos, Atiku was the choice of the Yar’Adua camp to become Abiola’s running mate.
Abiola overlooked him and picked the more cerebral diplomat and bureaucrat,
Babagana Kingibe. In all the tonnes of biographies written about him, there was
no where he said he opposed Shehu Yar’Adua’s support for his candidacy as
Abiola’s VP. He was not against it, since it favoured him. Now, it is
politically convenient and opportunistic for him to oppose the Tinubu-Shettima
ticket.
5. Political Credentials: Most reprehensible was Atiku’s
lies about how many times he ran to become the governor of Adamawa or old
Gongola state.
Mr. Presidential candidate, in case you don’t know due to
your limited education, you run for an office, only, when you are on the ballot
in an election. Your signifying interest in an office does not mean the same as
running for the office. From available records, the first time you contested
the governorship election in your state was in 1999. Your name entered the
ballot for the first time and you won.
6. Poor grasp of history: Atiku Abubakar also exhibited poor
Knowledge of history when he claimed that Abraham Lincoln, one of America’s
famous leaders, contested the presidency five to six times before he eventually
won.
This is a beer parlour tale that has been recycled over
time. Lincoln contested the U.S. presidency twice. He ran in 1860 and 1864 and
won both, before he was assassinated on 15 April, 1865.
The false story about Lincoln’s failed presidential bids
sprang from his previous failed state and national elections, from his state of
Illinois. They were not the same as America’s presidential election.
According to historians, Lincoln lost his first election in
1832 for Illinois state legislature. In 1834, he ran again and won.
In 1843 he ran for Congress. He lost. Three years later in
1846, Lincoln ran for Congress again – this time he won and went to Washington.
From established history, in 1848, Lincoln ran for re-election to Congress and
lost. In 1854, he ran for Senate of the United States. He lost. Lincoln also
made another failed bid for the U.S. Senate from Illinois in 1858. He lost to
Democrat Steven Douglas.
Our conclusion is that Alhaji Atiku Abubakar is ill-prepared
to be President of Nigeria if he could bungle a Television interview that was
planned well ahead of the day and time the duo of Dr. Reuben Abati and
Ms.Tundun Abiola conducted it.
We expected the PDP presidential candidate to be well
informed on any issue before coming on national television to expose himself to
avoidable ridicule.
Advertise on NigerianEye.com to reach thousands of our daily users
No comments
Post a Comment
Kindly drop a comment below.
(Comments are moderated. Clean comments will be approved immediately)
Advert Enquires - Reach out to us at NigerianEye@gmail.com