Nigeria| Politics: Presidency Fires Back At Igbo Leaders

President Buhari

The presidency has fired back at Igbo leaders under the aegis of Igbo Leaders of Thought who had earlier criticised the Buhari administration.

Vanguard reports that the Igbo Leaders of Thought criticized the administration’s prosecution of the war against corruption, which it described as selective. According to the group, the government was being teleguided by the former leaders of Nigeria, Generals Ibrahim Gbadamosi Babangida, Abdulsalami Abubakar and Olusegun Obasanjo.

The Igbo leaders classified the former heads of state as belonging to what they called “the invisible government of Nigeria”.

The presidency reacted to the criticism through a statement issued by Mallam Shehu Garba, the senior special assistant on media and publicity, on August 15, Saturday.

“Whoever knows President Buhari will not say that kind of thing of him. Nobody can teleguide President Buhari as a leader because he is a listening leader. He will listen to Chief Obasanjo, he will listen to Dr Jonathan, he will listen to everybody, both high and low; and that is what a good leader should do.

“He will listen to everyone as a leader who is open to all. Nobody should lose sight of the fact that responsibility is his own and he is conscious of that. So, saying that somebody is teleguiding him cannot be the case,” he stated.

Speaking on the government’s intention to probe corrupt practices, Garba stressed that though the administration was not probing anybody at the moment, his principal could not stop the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) from doing their work.

The presidential spokesperson stressed that Buhari swore to protect the Constitution of Nigeria; therefore, he cannot turn a deaf ear to the looting of the public treasury and crude oil theft.

“People who don’t know him can make those assumptions but those who know him cannot make the mistake of saying this. From his days as a candidate, he said government will not dissipate time and energy on probes. As I speak to you now, President Buhari’s government has not engaged in probes.

“Government is not probing anybody at the moment. But there are matters that he has turned on the table, going through the processes of investigations by the EFCC, ICPC; whatever, those things are, they must go on. Whatever is on the table must be treated. 

“In Nigeria, if people have stolen money running into billions of US Dollars, crude oil in billions of US Dollars, the Constitution of Nigeria does not permit President Buhari to wave that off. He has no power. If the EFCC is investigating the theft of the assets of the country, the President cannot be legally and morally right to stop that from happening. So, this is what is going on,” he said.

Earlier this month, the Igbo Leaders of Thought issued a stern warning to the Buhari administration not to humiliate former president, Goodluck Jonathan, all in the name of probing his administration. In its statement the group stressed that the probe must be devoid of “witch-hunting and smear agenda”.

Vanguard News