The All Progressives Congress, APC, in Ekiti State on Tuesday described the state governor, Mr. Ayodele Fayose and his party – the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, as the greatest problems of the country.
It stated that the governor’s lawless public conduct constitutes a threat to democracy and by extension the nation’s economic development, while the PDP prepared the ground for an atmosphere of insecurity that is scaring investors from Nigeria.
Reacting to Fayose’s allegation that President Muhammadu Buhari is Nigeria’s problem, the APC Publicity Secretary in Ekiti, Taiwo Olatunbosun, said, in a statement in Ado-Ekiti, that instead of describing the President as the nation’s problem, Fayose had proved conclusively that he and his party represented a bad advertisement for the practice of democracy, which is the precursor to good governance that encourages in-flow of foreign investments.
He said the governor’s records in the nation’s practice of democracy cast a blot on Nigeria’s integrity as a democracy hub, where economic development thrives as a result of adherence to the rule of law and transparent conduct of government business.
“During his first term between 2003 and 2006, all international development agencies operating in Ekiti State, including the World Bank and British DFID, relocated from Ekiti when the agencies could no longer cope with the opaque manner Fayose was conducting government’s business in relation to the agencies’ partnership with his administration.
Olatunbosun added that Fayose “improved on his lawless conduct” shortly before he was sworn in on October 16, 2014 when he allegedly invaded the court to stop delivery of judgment on his perjury case, attacking the judges with thugs and tearing their coats while court records in the Chief Judge’s office were torn into shreds after beating his secretary “blue and black” and windows and doors of the court were destroyed.
He explained that this incident resonated around the world, sending wrong signal that Nigeria was a country where lawlessness thrived with the culprits going scot-free.
He said: “Again, Fayose’s name rang around the world when he masterminded the greatest electoral fraud in history, mobilising the military for treason to menace the opposition, compromising INEC by illegally obtaining its sensitive materials and drawing on nation’s defence vote to manipulate his election in what is Nigeria’s greatest electoral blues known as Ekitigate.”
The APC spokesman further claimed that PDP bred insecurity that was scaring investors from Nigeria when it deliberately neglected to fight Boko Haram while the funds for weapons to fight the insurgents was shared by PDP leaders, including the governor, who allegedly got more than N2bn to run his election, including spending it to allegedly purchase choice properties that EFCC had since seized.
He noted that it is on record that world leaders, including the US Secretary of State, John Kerry, recently praised Buhari in his anti-corruption war, adding that while the President was convincing world leaders that he could change their perception of Nigeria as a corrupt country, the image that PDP had created for the country was a major challenge that the country was still battling with.
“Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala recently told the world that the administration of President Goodluck Jonathan frittered a heavy foreign reserves built by Presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and Umar Musa Yar’Adua while he failed to save for the rainy days despite the huge oil receipts within six years but instead resorted to borrowing foreign and local loans to pay salaries while obligations to contractors were ignored, thus piling up the nation’s debts that are disincentive to the in-flow of foreign investments,” he said.
Olatunbosun added that the governor was always edgy anytime the Federal Government applied the law to deal with suspects in alleged frauds that had stunted the nation’s growth and development.
“Fayose is criticising the President again because more illicit wealth of his associates in the looting of Nigeria is being exposed.
“The latest in the line of his associates named in alleged fraud is Mrs Patience Jonathan, who once described Fayose as his ‘young husband’ at a campaign rally.
“We are equally aware that Fayose is jittery that EFCC may soon quiz him for using state funds to pay lawyers defending Mrs Patience Jonathan whose accounts were recently frozen by the EFCC.
“The greatest fear that always rattles the ‘fearless’ Fayose is whenever a looter is uncovered by the Federal Government because he knows what is coming for him after the EFCC traced billions of illegal funds to his frozen accounts.
“If today Buhari drops his anti-corruption war, Fayose will throw a lavish party to celebrate an open cheque to Ekiti treasury,” he concluded in the statement.
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