The National Publicity Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party, Olisa Metuh, on Tuesday, July 7, 2015 said release of over N804 billion from the nation’s coffers as bailout to states and local governments across the country contracdicts the earlier impression created by President Mohammadu Buhari that he met an “empty treasury”.
He said the party noted that a significant amount of the bailout came from savings accumulated in the Excess Crude Account handed over to the Buhari-led All Progressives Congress, APC’s administration by the past PDP-led administration.
Olisah Metuh noted that the bailout would go along way to alleviate the sufferings of Nigeria but that the president should retract those statement.
He said;“This development is in clear contradiction to the earlier impression given by President Buhari to Nigerians and the international community that they should not expect much from his administration in its first one hundred days because according him, upon assumption of office, he met a virtually empty treasury.
“We want to believe that given the President’s release of such huge amount, he may have realized that he was earlier misdirected on the actual financial state of the nation at the time he took over. In this regard, we expect the President, as a respected statesman to do the needful to correct that erroneous impression.
“Furthermore, we expect President Buhari’s APC administration as direct beneficiary of this savings initiated by past PDP administrations to appreciate the strategic importance of always saving for rainy days and as such guarantee prudent and transparent management of the nation’s resources now under its care.”
PDP has charged the APC as a “party in government to put its house in order, desist from injecting confusion and distracting the President from settling down to form a government and face the enormous challenges of governance, especially the implementation of his long list of campaign promises to Nigerians”.
