The Director General of Voice of Nigeria (VON) Mr. Osita Okechukwu, has scored President Muhammadu Buhari above average, while declaring that the present administration had built a foundation for Nigeria’s resurgence, based on his Social Revolution.
In a statement in Enugu, the APC chieftain noted that the Buhari Social Revolution (BSR) has resulted in the sanitization of corrupt institutions, revamping of solid minerals, innovation of ICT and repositioning of agricultural sector for enhanced productivity.
Okechukwu faulted those who were using the abject poverty, hunger and gross unemployment ravaging the country to score President Buhari low.
He said such people neither seemed to care about those who stimulated the woes in the first place, nor do they credit Buhari with the concerted efforts and enabling environment put in place in the last 24 months to upgrade agriculture and stop importation of food.
According to the VON DG, like every silent revolution, those who scored him (Buhari) low “wittingly or unwittingly couldn’t locate the Buhari Social Revolution, which in actual sense is the Rock of Gibraltar for Nigeria’s Resurgimento.”
He observed that certainty in public affairs was gradually being enthroned, unbridled corruption being tamed, Boko Haram and other forms of insecurity being contained and construction workers returning back to work, while impunity had been bade farewell.
The statement read in part: “Buhari did not invent the Treasury Single Account (TSA), the Biometric Verification Numbers (BVN) nor the Whistleblower policy; yet he gave them life as effective and potent anti-graft arsenal. If Nigeria is a country where records are kept and timely reported, billions of Naira saved by these anti-graft instruments could have been mind-boggling.
‘Critics would argue that they have led to retrenchment in the banks, yes every coin has two faces. But let the truth be told, can we actually call what we have banks, when they cannot lend to the real sector, because of outrageous interest rate and other unprofessional practices.
“Over the years banks make jumbo profits while majority of Nigerians slide into poverty. These are the holes which the Buhari Social Revolution is silently plugging.
“How many of the critics of the regime will remember that at the inception of his regime, Buhari instead of pursuing new projects to make name doled out billions for the payment of salary and pensions arrears owed by the state governments?
“As a pro-people ideologue he said that the workers welfare should come first, as some states owed for over ten months. As a result, many lives were saved, vindicating the position of the 1999 Constitution that the welfare and security of the people is the primary purpose of government”.
He noted that the main reason why some scored Buhari low was because of the slump in oil prices, the mono-product and life blood of our economy, which was made worse by the unprecedented looting which stripped the revenue and assets of the last bounty oil season, (2009-2014), whereas records had it that between these Jonathan locust five years, oil price hovered around $100 per barrel.
Okechukwu maintained that in rating Buhari, his critics forgot that he was not instrumental to the slump in oil prices and accordingly “our misery, emanating from fluctuations of oil price in the international market, which we have no control over and why Mr. President was putting emphasis on the diversification of the economy, to open other sectors and make them to compete with oil as revenue earner.”
He equally noted that some people score Buhari low because of their animosity on the way some of them who were close to Mr. President skewed and hoarded the appointments which could have accommodated those who worked day and night to make the Buhari Brand in the first place possible.
He admitted that one cannot dismiss the allegations, but assured there was still time to use the remaining appointments as a balm to heal the grievance of party members, because they were entitled to it as democracy dividends.
He acknowledged Buhari’s zeal for continuation of old projects, thereby returning thousands of workers back to work, adding that from day one he mandated his men to make sure that they completed ongoing projects before awarding new ones.