FOR declaring his assets about 100 day into office, human rights campaigner and lawyer, Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa has flayed President Muhammadu Buhari, saying the action is belated.
He also frowned at the alleged ‘selective governance’ and closure of Aso Villa chapel by the president, which are contrary to his solemn declaration to all Nigerians.
He said: “This action of the President, coming after Nigerians have made this demand upon him several months ago, is rather belated and serves no useful purpose, presently.
For the assets declaration to make any meaningful impact, it should have been declared voluntarily and without any prompting upon the President, by Nigerians.
The implication of this is that the President was forced to declare his assets. “Secondly, the assets declaration is coming after Nigerians, through their most diligent efforts, have already uncovered most of the President’s ‘secret assets’, especially the house in Abuja. By now, most of the contents of the President’s assets declaration document are already in the public domain.
So this declaration, serves no useful purpose, except it is meant to gather public sympathy for the president, in the absence of any concrete programme of action.”
According to him, it was in his ‘Covenant with Nigeria’, that the President made a solemn promise to publicly declare his assets, within the first 100 days of his administration, but regretted that that document has since been disowned by the President, in a way that has traumatised the psyche of most Nigerians. “The President would seem to have only used the voters during his electioneering campaigns, by giving us the impression that he was committed to that document, only to turn around to disown it, after he had won the election.
Having broken that solemn covenant, there was no longer any need, for the President to bother himself, about some dry assets declaration. “Furthermore, the information supplied to the public by the President is so scanty, as to totally amount to hoarding vital details of his assets.
The law requires him to also declare the assets of all his grown up children and the assets of all his wives. This information is glaringly missing”, he declared.
The fiery lawyer also said the president bombarded Nigerians with the campaign of war against corruption and as a result, labeled almost every project of the past administration, as laden with corruption.
He noted that such projects are either cancelled outright, or suspended temporarily, citing the cases of the second Niger Bridge, the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway construction and the Ore-Shagamu expressway construction. “One would have thought that this would be the trend all over the land.
But alas, the President was comfortable to retain and indeed commend the Abuja Centenary Project, of the same Jonathan administration, which has now been singled out of the corrupt projects.
The President has endorsed it for completion. “The implication of this is very worrisome. It would seem that the message that the President is currently sending to the people of Nigeria, is that the issue of corruption is determined by the geographical location of a project.
So that if a project, of the Jonathan administration, is located in Abuja or some other northern part of Nigeria, then it is safe to continue and indeed complete it, but if the same project is located in Lagos or some other southern part of Nigeria, then it has to be cancelled and abandoned, as it must be marred in corruption”, he stated.
He added that it has become necessary for the president to direct the immediate resumption and completion of all ongoing projects of the Jonathan administration, that are located in the southern parts of Nigeria, for equity and fairness.
From all the foregoing, it is necessary for the President to urgently apologise to Nigerians over the scandal of the denial of his Covenant with Nigerians, direct the immediate resumption of construction work on the Lagos-Ibadan expressway and Ore-Shagamu expressway, and open the Aso Rock Villa for Christian worship,” he said.
