State of the Nation: Group Slams President Buhari For Pretending All Is Well

By Akinwale Kasali

The Centre for Truth and Liberty, CTL, a non-governmental Organisation, has slammed the President Muhammadu Buhari administration for pretending that all is well with the nation in the wake of the Covid-19 outbreak. The group says the Federal Government is making light of the situation of citizens  who are languishing in hunger, poverty and insecurity.

CTL in a statement signed by Olusesan Semaye, the Executive Director  and Francis Abayomi, Director, Research, Communication and Strategy said that the posture of the  leadership in the country  to pretend that all was well with the polity is futile and worrisome.

It stressed that it reeks of careless advertorial of culture of impunity that has become a virtue accustomed with public office, for the Secretary to the Government of the Federation,  Boss Mustapha, to publicly  deny  that he never knew the Nigerian health sector was in an appalling state until he was saddled with responsibility of coordinating the Presidential Task Force on Covid-19.

Mustapha’s admission, the group said, smacks of failure, and ought to have been followed with a letter of resignation considering his position in a government under which billions of naira was earmarked annually ostensibly for equipping the presidential clinic in Aso Rock and for which nothing concrete had been put in place to meet requirements for any emergency response to Covid-19.

Said the statement: “Unfortunately, rather than offer profuse apologies for the glaring and unpardonable failure that has consigned Nigeria into a state of alarming socio-economic quagmire which has regrettably manifested in a comatose health system in spite of yearly budgetary allocations, it is worrisome that the present ruling elite has unashamedly positioned the government as a worthy recipient of Covid-19 emergency donations from individuals, corporate bodies as well as concerned international stakeholders.”

It reads further: “Having failed to bequeath functional healthcare infrastructure prior to the entry of Covid-19 pandemic into the country, the ruling elite has no legitimate justification or moral integrity to mobilise donations or supports from non-state actors in the bid to be seen as championing the revalorization of the health sector.

“It should however be instructive Covid-19 and the attendant challenges posed by the imperative of containing the contagion has exposed the bankruptcy of a false polity founded on promoting the narrow interest of thieving political oligarchy at the expense of overwhelming majority of the citizenry.

“CTL, however, holds that the tragedy of the exposé of leadership deficit in the wake of Covid-19 reality is not just about the giddying indictment thrown at the faces of ruling elite who together with their relations and cronies have been forced to remain in Nigeria with no other option than to patronise the same healthcare facilities they left in utter ruins for decades.

“The ultimate challenge for Nigerians, at the end of Covid-19 episode, would be failure to unite around the gripping clamour for new generation of leadership capable of restoring hope to overwhelming population of citizens in despair who are currently faced with the compelling brave to survive daily miseries which Nigerian society has become”.

The CTL says it condemns the failure of President Buhari in its entirety during his address to the nation on April 13, 2020 to demonstrate empathy for Nigerians who were ruthlessly attacked and humiliated by soldiers and police following the restriction of movement imposed in his earlier address of April 29, 2020.

” It is unfortunate that Mr. President rather than condemn this act chose to pretend he was not aware of unwarranted ordeals Nigerians; including those on legitimate assignment amongst who were journalists experienced in the hands of overzealous security agents.

“CTL is concerned that President Buhari as Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces in a democratic setting has not, even prior to the present scenario, demonstrated enough concern by consciously dissuading security agencies from molesting innocent Nigerians. CTL condemns unprovoked attacks on Nigerians by security agents who are obliged under the law to adopt civilised methods in apprehending violators of civil restrictions.

“CTL is worried about the spate of robbery incidents, civil disturbances and insecurity stirred by the frustration of two weeks of lockdown at the federal capital territory (FCT) as well as in Lagos and Ogun States. The development glaringly comes down as telling portrayal of the prevailing fragile nature of the Nigerian society. There is no doubt that palliatives introduced by the federal and state government have proven to be grossly inadequate to assuage the angers of millions of Nigerian already sidelined by the polity. It is thus important to emphasise that idea of palliative in itself is too little and boils down to tokenism which cannot offer solution to present consequence of looming socio-economic crises in the country.”

Palliative measures, it says, underpin the failure of a system that should be offering stimuli to teeming population of productively engaged workforce as seen in countries across the world in the wake of Covid-19 epidemic.

CTL, therefore, called on “platforms of civil society genuinely committed to the cause of responsive governance to connect their efforts and voices to the grassroots for the purposes of mobilising ahead for the enthronement of responsible leadership across board capable of bequeathing genuine democratic virtues and standards.”