Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar yesterday came under fire over his warning that revolution is imminent due to hunger and hardship in the country.
Dismissing the alarm as a product of outdated thinking, the Presidency and the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) said Atiku is out of touch with reality.
“Atiku and his party are stuck in the past, fixated on doomsday scenarios and revolutionary rhetoric,” the Presidency said in a statement by the Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga.
He said while the country is making progress under President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s administration, it is curious that what Atiku can decipher is imaginary gloom.
Onanuga added, “Talk is cheap. Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar and his handlers are clearly out of touch with the positive developments unfolding in our country.
“Their claim that hunger is ravaging Nigeria, and their comparison of our situation to the unrest in France before the 1789 Revolution or the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, is grossly misleading.”
Also berating Atiku for making a reckless statement, APC National Publicity Secretary Felix Morka, said only the former vice president sees hopelessness where every Nigerian sees hope.
Atiku, 2023 presidential candidate of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the arrowhead of the opposition coalition that adopted the African Democratic Congress (ADC) as platform, alleged that the Tinubu administration has not made impact in two years.
He said if the PDP government under which Atiku served had laid a good foundation and avoided corruption, the country would have been a better place.
Incidentally, on the same day that Atiku made the claim on hunger, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) released the Consumer Protection Index (CPI), which shows that due to rapidly dropping food prices, inflation had declined for the fifth consecutive time. It is now 20.12 per cent.
Revolution looms, Atiku warns
Atiku, who alerted the country to an impending revolution, decried the increasing spate of hunger among the underprivileged poor and downtrodden.
He said in a statement by his spokesman, Paul Ibe, that while the primary objective of any government is the security and welfare of the citizens, the masses are progressively wallowing in misery and poverty under the administration.
Although the former vice president did not elaborate on the kind of revolution that is looming, he warned that the situation engenders an increasingly progressive propensity for criminalities, including high-wire fraud, terrorism, kidnapping, cultism, drug addiction and ritual sacrifice.
He recalled that the most violent socio-political eruptions and revolutions all over the world had often been powered by pervasive hunger and unbearable material conditions, especially the paradox of squalor amid plenty.
Atiku, who called for ‘national reflection,’ alluded to the French Revolution, the 1917 Russian Revolution and the Arab Spring in which a young man caught in the maelstrom of unbearable frustration set himself ablaze, leading to violent socio-political eruptions in Tunisia, Middle-East and North Africa.
He added: “Back home in Nigeria, it may not be out of place to argue that even the “ENDSARS” protest was fuelled by the traumatising frustration of hunger and insensitivity on the part of the government.”
Atiku lamented that two years after assuming power, there are no signs that the government is capable of addressing the severe hunger staring the poor in the face.
He said: “Whatever reform the Tinubu government might claim to be undertaking, the point remains that food insecurity is a daily occurrence.
“There is no government worth its salt that does not place priority on the welfare and security of the people.”
Atiku said since reforms are made for citizens and not the other way round, the reforms of the administration should have a human face.
He stressed: “Whether the present powers accept it or not, the reality of our existence is that the poor are increasingly dying of hunger while majority of the poor exists at the mercy of the ill-advised policies of this government.
Atiku wrong, says Presidency
However, Onanuga said Atiku offered a subjective analysis, pointing out that Nigerians are already savouring the bold reforms.
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He drew attention to the data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), which paints a different picture from Atiku’s claims.
The presidential aide said inflation had declined for five consecutive months, while the country recently posted a record trade surplus, with non-oil exports contributing nearly equally to the trade balance at a 48:52 per cent ratio compared to crude oil.
Onanuga added that Nigeria’s foreign reserves, which stood at $32 billion when President Tinubu assumed office — much of it encumbered — had risen to almost $42 billion after clearing more than $7 billion in arrears, including $800 million owed to airlines.
He said: “Under President Tinubu, Nigeria is recording unprecedented revenue. States are now able to pay salaries and gratuities promptly and still have surplus funds for capital and social projects—an achievement not previously witnessed at this scale.”
Onanuga said government is correcting the errors inherited from the PDP era, when Atiku was vice president, through bold reforms that are yielding results.
He stressed: “After just two years and five months in office, we are proud of the progress being made under President Tinubu’s leadership. Atiku and his allies may choose to ignore these gains, but Nigerians can see and feel the positive changes taking place across the nation.”
Morka: ex-VP out of touch with reality
Chiding Atiku for subjectivity, Morka said the former vice president was out of tune with reality.
He described the comments as incendiary and inciting, borne out of his desperation for power.
Morka, who spoke on television last night, said: “At this point, I want to believe Atiku is out of touch with what goes on in the country. If Atiku were paying attention to the unfolding economic programmes of this government, he wouldn’t make such a statement.
“When every paper is reporting lowering of inflation, he is making inciting comments. It is grossly disappointing that a man, who had the opportunity to end hunger, insecurity could not in eight years as vice president.
“It is wrong for him to say that. Nigerians know Atiku is desperate for power. He needs to rest; he has become irrelevant to any consideration of posterity.
“There is nothing he is saying today that should lead Nigerians to that point (revolution).
“A man like Atiku should be quiet. The same Atiku confessed how they squandered $21 billion meant for electricity.”
The Publicity secretary said President Tinubu initiated bold reforms to clean the mess perpetuated by PDP administrations.
He added: “The problems are a failure of those who came before him. President Tinubu has initiated reforms to tackle age-old problems. He is being scientific.
“Every government before him has not done anything to tackle the problem.
The Jonathan government and the one before him operated a phantom economy. Buhari served as a stabiliser, he came to hold the country so it won’t tip over. Buhari also didn’t create the problems contended with.”
Hailing the President for doing what no one has done in just two years, Morka said: “The President addressed the structural problems of the economy. Inflation has reduced, he has been vindicated.
“The benefits of his reforms are showing. Even Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala said Tinubu should be praised for stabilising the economy.”
The spokesman emphasised that following the fuel subsidy removal and naira floating, there is stability in the foreign exchange, stressing that the country now has the best balance of trade in Africa.
He added: “Hope is coming alive. The economy that was in tatters is now on solid ground. Nigerians are smart people and are seeing the signs. Farmers are smiling more. The future will get better.”
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