Former National Vice Chairman, North West of the All Progressives Congress, Salihu Lukman, has said the present administration must review its economic policies to douse public agitation.
Lukman, who resigned last June as a member of the APC National Working Committee stated this in a statement at the weekend, entitled, #EndBadGovernance Campaign: What Next?”
The nationwide protest was against the hardship being encountered by Nigerians as a result of the withdrawal of subsidies on petroleum products and the floating of the exchange rate of the Naira against other international currencies.
Lukman maintained that only a review of the economic policies could mitigate the anger among agitated Youths in the country whom he recalled has fixed October as the date for new round of protests.
“As it is, there are information suggesting that the organisers have announced October 1 as the date for the resumption of the protests. Every Nigerian should be worried about this development. With governments at all levels failing to engage the organisers, practically underestimating the capacity of the organisers to mobilise for the protests, ordinary citizens are left at the mercy an angry Nigerians. The truth is that virtually every ordinary citizen is a potential member of such an angry group simply because the condition of life in the country is harsh. Let no one be deceived, the situation affects virtually every living soul in Nigeria on a scale highly unimaginable and never experienced in the past.
“Without doubt, the trigger for our current situation is the withdrawal of subsidy on petroleum products and floating the exchange rate of the Naira against other international currencies. For an import-dependent economy, it is predictable that the two policies will produce inflationary pressure. Unfortunately, so far, the government of President Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu is unable to produce any clear definitive policy response to the situation. All that citizens hear the government to be saying is calling on citizens to be patient without outlining how long it will take for the harsh reality to abate. Meanwhile, daily, Nigerians confront challenges of hunger and threats to daily survival. Many citizens die prematurely on account of hunger and preventable diseases. While acknowledging government explanations about how bad the economy has been mismanaged by previous administrations, it must be stressed that being an elected government, Nigerian political leaders should be more responsive. The minimum should be to acknowledge the reality facing citizens and demonstrate some measure of compassion and seek to ameliorate the harsh condition facing citizens by relaxing some of these policies.”
The former Director General of the Progressive Governors Forum who expressed strong reservations over the failure of the dominant opposition parties to connect with masterminds of the nationwide protest further claimed that the existing opposition parties have been compromised by the federal government.
“With a conquest mentality, our leaders have proceeded to demobilise virtually all political structures in the country such that today Nigeria has earned the bad reputation of being a democracy without any functional political party. All the registered political parties are nothing but legal entities that only present candidates for elections. Partly, because of that reality there is none of the parties that is able to recruit the leaders of the #EndBadGovernance protest or at least publicly join the protest. Although individuals such as Alh. Atiku Abubakar and Mr. Peter Obi have declared support for the protest, they were unable to contract any strong relationship with the protest organisers.
“So long as political leaders and political parties in the country will be unable to contract strong relationships with veritable and energetic constituencies such as the #EndBadGovernance protest organisers, Nigerian democracy is imperiled. This could potentially increase the frustrations of Nigerians and may be responsible for the existence of high levels of desperations that produces the explosive realities associated with the last protest. We must caution that if this is left unattended to, and especially if the government continue with its grandstanding dispositions, doing nothing to either produce clear policy plans that will arrest the harsh realities facing Nigerians or produce functionally responsive measures that could ameliorate and unshackle citizens from the grip of hunger and starvation, the risk of the protest resuming any day before October 1 date is very high.”
