Hostilities In Presidency: Buhari’s FEC Has Become Cancerous – PDP Stresses
…Says FEC should be disbanded
BY GRACE ANYANWU, ABUJA – The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) on Tuesday said that the degenerated hostilities among officials in the President Muhammadu Buhari Presidency, including Presidential aides, ministers and heads of agencies, which have further exposed a scandalous breakdown of the administration’s central command system, is a mark of failure by the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led administration to provide organized leadership for the nation.
The Party specifically said that the President Buhari-led Federal Executive Council (FEC) has become cancerous, disorganized, chaotic, and incapable of driving an organized, result-oriented system and as such should be disbanded.
The PDP therefore counseled President Buhari to re-direct the course of the Nation’s tides by disbanding his “poorly assembled and dysfunctional” federal executive council.
The party in a statement said that its position is predicated on the degenerated hostilities among officials in the Buhari Presidency, including Presidential aides, ministers and heads of agencies, which have further exposed a scandalous breakdown of the administration’s central command system.
The statement which was signed by its National Publicity Secretary, Mr Kola Ologbondiyan stressed that a situation where officials are constantly at daggers drawn among themselves in unending clashes, backbiting, betrayals, leakage of sensitive documents and internal bickering over pecuniary and political interests, in manners not different from street skirmishes of common cult groups, is unacceptable to the nation.
The PDP said that it is indeed shocking that the acrimony had sunk to a situation where the Minister of Communication and Digital Economy, Isa Pantami, reportedly evicted the staff of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission (NIDCOM) from their allocated office, with guns, while the Chairman of the Commission, Hon. Abike Dabiri, was on official assignment with the President.
The party also said that currently, the newly appointed Chief of Staff to the President, Prof. Ibrahim Gambari and the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Boss Mustapha, are said to be at each other’s throat, with the SGF reportedly querying the decision of the President to sack the former Director of the Transmission Company of Nigeria, Mr. Usman Mohammed.
In the words of the PDP; “The situation had degenerated into serious confusion in the federal executive. Nigerians can recall the bitter wrangling, wherein the National Security Adviser (NSA), Major-General Babagana Monguno, earlier this year, alerted that Presidential responsibilities, including presiding over sensitive security matters, have been hijacked by late Chief of Staff, Mallam Abba Kyari, thereby frustrating the fight against insurgency and acts of violence ravaging our country.
“Furthermore, the power sector is still under the stress of squabbling between the SGF and the Minister of Power, Sale Mamman, with the SGF, reinstating some officials who were sacked by the minister in December last year.
“The nation has also not forgotten the embarrassing public fight between the First Lady, Aisha Buhari and President Muhammadu Buhari’s cousins, over rooms in the Presidential villa, which further exposed the chaotic situation in the President Buhari-led administration.
“Before then, the First Lady had alerted the nation that a cabal had hijacked the federal executive and taken over governance of our nation.
“It is sad that presidential hostilities had resulted in escalated cases of internal sabotage including the leakage of sensitive documents as exposed by the Head of Service, Dr. Folasade Yemi-Esan and recently witnessed in the embarrassing leakage of President Buhari’s draft COVID-19 speech,” PDP stated.
It further said that Nigerians can now see how vulnerable the nation has become and why it is extremely difficult for the country to witness any progress under the Buhari Presidency, which has also ruined all the gains achieved under the PDP.
The party also said; “Indeed, no nation can achieve meaningful development under a rancorous and shambolic federal executive council as currently constituted, with the height of irredeemable division among them.
The PDP noted that such a situation never obtained under its watch in the glorious years of our nation and therefore advised President Buhari to foreclose the parochial posturing of his administration by engaging more competent hands to run the affairs of our nation.