Your criticisms of Tinubu’s govt barren, group tells Atiku

Former vice president Atiku Abubakar has been challenged to offer a better economic blueprint, if he has any, to the present administration in the country in the spirit of national patriotism and demonstrable evidence of no bitterness and pull him down syndrome but genuine desire as an elder statesman to move Nigeria forward.

A civil society group, Congress for Good Governance for National Unity (CGGNU), said this in a statement, on Friday, in a statement by its National Chairman, Abiodun Fanoro.

The group said the time has come to interrogate Atiku’s patriotism and the genuineness of his long self-acclaimed determination and commitment to transforming the country and alleviating the suffering of the ordinary Nigerian.

The group said the need to question Atiku’s patriotism and possession of the right antidotes to the country’s myriad of challenges as well as the genuine desire to deploy them to the benefit of the people became imperative after a critical review of his avalanche of bitter criticism of President Bola Tinubu’s policies aimed at rejuvenating the economy.

Fanoro said: “Atiku rather than disparaging Chief Bode George and rather than continuing with what is obvious bitterness, envy and desperation as reflected in his unkind and charade criticism of President Tinubu, should advertise to Nigerians his better alternatives to what Tinubu is feeding Nigerians with.

“The difference between Atiku and George is that the retired Naval chief, as a democrat, has accepted that the 2023 presidential election has been won and lost but Atiku is yet to come to terms with the reality, which keeps fueling his bitter comments.”

The group noted that offering an alternative blueprint amounts to no crime, as the late Chief Obafemi Awolowo did it during the administration of the late Alhaji Shehu Shagari.

“Nigerians also offered an alternative blueprint to General Ibrahim Babangida during the famous debate on Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP).

“The former vice president may have found it difficult or disinteresting in outlining any elaborate blueprint if what he has is not different from what he presented during the 2023 presidential election which was obviously rejected by the electorate as revealed by his rejection at the poll.

“Notwithstanding this, if he is truly a concerned patriot, after the election, Atiku could have constituted a think-tank team to give him a new blueprint in the overall interest of the ordinary Nigerian,” it added.

The group urged Atiku to remember that his ambition to rule Nigeria, the very reason he was allegedly accused of discrediting every policy of Tinubu without offering known and logical alternatives, could only be realised in a preserved and united Nigeria, not by using his desperation for the presidential ticket of the PDP to ruin his party.