The House of Representatives caucus of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, has said Nigeria, under the rulership of General Muhammad Buhari, has been seized by hostage-takers – bandits and terrorists – who exact ransom demands on the poor and impoverished citizens and turn homesteads, hamlets, villages, towns and cities into killing fields.
The caucus said that the bloodletting unleashed by the hostage-takers, which has gone unabated, with General Buhari showing complete incapacity to arrest the situation, or bring the killer squads who roam the vast swathes of our country to book, is spreading across every acreage of citizens’ habitation and turning our once quiet and peaceful homesteads, hamlets, villages, towns and cities into funeral parlours and cemeteries.
“Everywhere we turn, today, our dead are either being prepared for burials by families whose hearts are torn up by grief or they are being mourned by families who can’t tell where the killer squads will turn up next” , Rep O.K Chinda, Chairman, PDP Caucus, House of Representatives said.
“Here is the stark truth of the Nigerian condition under Buhari’s ruinous rule: citizens are in a prolong, severe and intense state of mourning that has kept them stuck in acute anguish, pain and trauma.
“In his recent remark at the sidelines of the COP26 Conference in Scotland, United Kingdom, General Buhari boasted: “We will defeat them, one highway, one rail link- and one job- at a time”. It is over three weeks since the Conference ended, no stone of resistance has been mobilized by the General against bandits, terrorists and kidnappers. Rather, and sadly, bandits, terrorists and kidnappers continue to unleash their reigns of terror on hapless citizens, taking not “one highway, one rail link – and one job – at a time” but whole communities and regions in fell swoops whenever they choose to strike. The communities of Sabon Birni of Sokoto state, Kagara of Niger state, Karim Lamido of Taraba state, Katoge and Yanturaku of Katsina state, and of the north east, north west, south south and south east are witnesses to the reigns of terror.
“Unfortunately, the General who famously boasted of leading from the front is now missing in action.
“General Buhari is concerned only about his personal and family safety, and the safety of his lackeys. Typical of rulers in history who suffered from messianic complex, he thinks his personal survival is tantamount to the survival of the nation. It is this delusion that makes the governance of our country dire and costly under his rulership. There’s something more ruinous about his delusion: he promotes himself beyond his talent of statecraft. Like Caligula, the delusional Roman emperor in history, who ordered that ships be lined up in a double anchor to form a bridge, so he could ride his horses across the gulf of Baiae to prove the prophesy of Thrasyllus the astrologer wrong that he had no chance of emerging as an emperor “than riding over the gulf of Baiae with horses”, General Buhari is deploying scarce state resources against peaceful protesters who are calling attention to the killings in the North to prove that he is an emperor.
“In the past one month Nigerians have waited on General Buhari to give assent to the Electoral Reform Bill passed to him by the National Assembly. As at past midnight of Sunday 19 December 2021, following the expiration of the thirty days mandated by the Constitution for his presidential assent, he has neither communicated with the National Assembly nor shown any indication of doing so, leaving Nigerians confounded by a President who continues to show utter disdain for the Constitution and the reform of the institutions of state. Under him, our institutions of state have regressed, to the point that the gains of previous state’s institutions reforms, embarked by Our Great Party while in power, have been either lost to his inaction or to his deliberate ploy to leave our country worse than he met it. On this point alone, we are not convinced that he is interested in the reform of the Electoral process.
“So, whatever choice he makes, which is likely a refusal to assent to the above-mentioned Bill, he would be staying with his party and doing the bidding of his party’s apparatchiks – party stalwarts who are only interested in electoral heists.
“A ruling party that cannot conduct its national convention lacks the capacity to implement some of the innovative and people-empowering provisions of the Bill, like the Direct Party Primaries and electronic transmission of results. As an opposition caucus we ensure that our members exercise their power under Section 58(5) of the Constitution to veto the President whenever the National Assembly reconvenes.
“Finally, we make bold to remind General Buhari of the saying of that old Greek General, Chabrias the Athenian, that “an army of sheep led by a lion is more feared than an army of lions led by a sheep”.
“But, our nation and its people don’t have the luxury of time to wait on General Buhari to transform from the intrepid General who is currently missing in action to the lion that leads from the front, when bandits, terrorists and kidnappers who have seized our nation by the scruff of the neck are inflicting malevolence on the nation and imposing informal rules on citizens to command obedience to their diktats.
Time is running out. General Buhari should save our country by resigning NOW”.
