The Chairman of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) South African chapter, Hon Ekos Akpokabayen have called on Nigerians at home and in the diaspora to resist every intimidation aimed at silencing their democratic voice by the present APC led government and demand their rights with regards to administrative responsibility.
Akpokabayen made this known in a statement issued to The Nation, said that Nigerians should not be cowed to continue believing that the high-level incompetence, corruption and the military democracy they are witnessing today under Buhari and the APC almost 3 years down the line is still about the said errors of the PDP as they were made to believe from the beginning.
He noted that the recent corruption and counter corruption revelations under the present Buhari and APC-led government should serve as an eye opener for Nigerians all over the world. A lot has been covered and most of them swept under the carpet because the Nigerian masses are intimidated not to ask questions, we are slowly and tactically returning back to the era of military regimes which we all collectively vomited out over a decade ago.
Akpokabayen, who have consistently lend his voice against ill governance in Nigeria said “It is time for every Nigerian who can see clearly to rise and ask questions and demand for accountability, we must refer President Buhari and his APC back to the 81 point bogus campaign promises which one very prominent among them is that “all public office holders under the APC led government must be barred from seeking Medicare overseas” which he the president himself has violated over and over again”, he said.
Akpokabayen noted that the discovery a few days ago by the wife of the president, Hajia Aisha Buhari on the total emptiness of the state house clinic in Aso Rock, is very revealing, “I had to go back to those campaign promises because if Buhari and the APC made such promissory vow to Nigerians as part of their joker to deceive them into getting them to power, then it is the time to ask them to give account.”
He added that the same president who made bold with the above promissory vow allotted billions of taxpayers’ money from the 2016 and 2017 and even beginning from 2015 national budgets respectively for the running of the same clinic which is solely meant for him but which he never visited even in his times of medical needs, instead he left the country for the United Kingdom in breach of his avowed campaign promises where another bunch of hundreds of millions of taxpayers’ money were wasted on different medical visits/vacations which ran into several months.
He asked how many of our hospitals are being maintained and functional today? If only the same state house clinic under review received over N11 billion yearly budgetary allocations and yet the sole beneficiary never visited it for once then it is time for Nigerians to redefine “corruption”,
Akpokabayen said: “it should baffle Nigerians that given all the billions that have gone down the drains so far, it was only few days ago that the wife of the president could discover the monumental rot under her husband’s administrative nose yet he has been chasing shadows outside in the name of trying to kill corruption, non-accountability to me is the worst kind of corruption, followed by nepotism which is the order of the day here as it is now”.
He further stated that Nigerians under the new administration were deceived into accepting the unnecessary increment of the prices of petroleum products especially the Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) with yet another bogus promise of using the proceeds to develop infrastructures and better the lives of the masses, almost 2 years have gone, nothing, not one thing to show for it, and Nigerians have once more learnt and resolved to live with it without no questions.
On the issue of the most recent $25 billion frivolous contracts scandal at the NNPC as exposed by a first line insider, the minister of state for petroleum Dr. Ibe Kachikwu which has been greeted with conflicting narratives as to what and how it happened, said that it is another memorable act of corruption that should not go away so quickly from our hearts unquestioned.
This, he stated that calls for serious concern by Nigerians, such revelation coming from an NNPC front-liner and the very minister of state for petroleum is over-weighty for us to allow it to be settled and come out to display some fraudulent coloration of facial smiles and handshakes on national television stations, it will be an error of the century for Nigeria and Nigerians”, it amounts to yet setting the worst precedence for our great nation,” he said.
He called on members of the PDP across the world to reposition themselves for the grand take overcome 2019.
“We must do all it takes and use every instrument of truth to enlighten Nigerians on the foundational defects, lies, propaganda, calumny, misrule, dictatorial military democracy, high level and very tactical corruptions, disrespect to the rules of law, Human Rights abuses all over the nation”, he said.
He continued: “I plead with my party, the PDP that there can never be any other time than this for us to come together, get all the fact on the table and begin to show Nigerians the very clear difference between a true democracy and a faulty one which is militarized.
