Former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Professor Tam David-West has likened the ongoing events in the country to serious ‘sickness.
The elder statesman said that Nigeria was gradually retrogressing and there’s need to effect a change of leadership at the next elections.
The Ijaw Niger Delta leader who spoke at the monthly lecture of City People Magazine on Thursday night, specifically said ‘Nigeria’s head is rotten’ and needed to be changed before it affects the body.
The former Minister corroborated the position of the former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo that the ‘country is actually sick.’
“This country is sick. I don’t know what virus is affecting Nigeria. It is even more than a virus. Ironically, we have done everything to kill her but God is keeping Nigeria. So, we have to keep her because God has a purpose for her.
“My fear is that Nigeria is going down. We cannot go on like this. Our economy is in trouble. Unemployment rises on daily basis, yet, our minis ter in charge of the economy said 10 million jobs have been created. It is all lies.
“President Goodluck Jonathan should borrow a leaf from the Obafemi Awolowo and Shehu Shagari episode when Awolowo told Shagari that the ship of the state is wreck ing. Shagari didn’t abuse him. But what happened afterward, the military toppled Shagari’s government.
“Jonathan’s men should stop abusing Obasanjo for being patriotic enough to cry out but they should rather reflect on the state of the nation, espe cially its economy,” the retired university teacher stated.
David-West, who spoke on the topic; ‘How to move Nigeria forward: My thoughts’, stated that the country had all along been walloping on inconsistent economic policies and unstable and ephemeral political system with her leaders deceiving the populace since Independence.
On the fallen fortunes of the oil industry, the former Minister decried the shady businesses going on in the oil-rich Niger Delta, where he incidentally hails from, lamenting that there ‘is too much stealing going on in the oil sector.’
“We may soon be in trouble, especially those of us from that region because the United States is no longer buy ing oil. We have nothing again to survive on in that place.
“But the problem is that Nigeria head is rot ten. Our people say if the head of a fish is rotten, the whole body is rotten. In Nigeria situation, we pray the body will not be rotten. And that is why we said the head should go before it affects the body,” he stated.
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