Ibrahim Musa
Bukola Saraki, President of the Senate and the Director General of the Atiku Abubakar Presidential Campaign is suffering and needs urgent attention. Were he still familiar with Medicine- his primary profession- he could have properly examined himself for the destructive symptoms of delirium and hallucination. If he were, we would have urged him to embrace the age-old axiom: Physician heal thyself!
Nothing demonstrates Bukola’s fusty state of mind than his recent hallucinations with official figures of fuel importation into the country. Saraki had claimed during an interview on Channels Television on Wednesday that Nigeria’s petrol consumption is about 20-22 million litres per day and that the current import level of about 50 million litres per day is a “a big-time fraud.”
Saraki rubbished his position as the number three man in the Government when he made such a grave deliberate falsification of figures without quoting any official document. The senate president glibly stated that “any expert” will tell you that Nigeria’s daily PMS consumption could not be more than 22 million litres.
Everyone understands that this is campaign season and politicians would capitalize on anything that could give them electoral victory. But it becomes an unpardonable political gaffe for anyone, especially a President of the Nigerian Senate, to lie about figures that are documented just to sell himself to the electorate.
Let us remind Saraki that the 7thSenate of which he was a member conducted several hearings on fuel subsidy and NNPC where it was publicly disclosed that the daily PMS consumption in 2014 and 2015 was 35-40 million litres. In January 2014, for example, the average monthly consumption was 38 million litres per day.
By January 2015, under the same government of PDP they reported 36 million litres per day and in March 2015 the daily consumption reported by the PDP Government was 45 million litres, while importation was at levels above 80 million litres per day. These are official figures in the custody of the senate, and most likely in the document shelve of Saraki.
It is strange that Saraki would now tell Nigerians on television years later that fuel consumption figure had gone down to 20-22 million litres of fuel per day! It defies economic logic, and even commonsense to suggest that a country where population, rural-urban drift and vehicles are on the increase will see such a drastic fall in fuel consumption rate.
During the same interview, Saraki also exposed his fading political career when he blamed the rejection of his presidential candidate by Nigerians, especially wealthy donors on the Muhammadu Buhari Administration. He accused the Administration of stifling the opposition because no one is willing to donate to his cause.
Read him: “The atmosphere does not allow the kind of campaigns people are used to. The general feeling is that the APC is choking the campaigns. If you look at support groups, fund raising dinners. Fund raising dinners in 2015 were everywhere. People were having dinners with the business community trying to raise money. Now most business communities don’t even want to come out and see that they are getting involved in politics. The environment now is different”, he said.
Saraki should be ashamed of himself for blaming the Administration for the rejection of his campaign. Is Saraki so delirious that he has become incapable of analyzing situations rightly? Is he so dumb that he cannot see his own political denouement? Can he not see, as most Nigerians have seen, that he, like a film unraveling before our very eyes, is coming to an end?
No responsible Nigerian will be willing to donate to the presidential ambition of either Saraki or his principal Atiku Abubakar, after what is already in the public space about them and some of their colleagues. Saraki has become a bad product even in his home state of Kwara. His famed but phantom political empire has crumbled under the weight of his infamous actions. His masquerade has been unmasked and he no longer has a hiding place.
Anyone who doubts my views should just walk into any streets in Ilorin, the state capital, and ask questions about Saraki. It is shocking, but not unexpected, how quickly Saraki seemed to have unraveled. Today, influential clerics in the state are denouncing him and his political ideology, and urging people of the state to reject him and everything he stands for. His candidate lost the bye-election into the House of Representatives recently conducted by INEC in the senatorial district of Governor Ahmed!
Saraki also said the campaign for the forthcoming election should not be on sentiments but be based on “what we see.” And he went on to make his characteristic false claims that there were no security problems in 2015 in the North West, North Central and North East! But that today all three zones have security challenges. I beg your pardon?
Did Saraki truly believed himself when he uttered those statements? Or was he just playing his usual politics of mischief and propaganda? Even school children would know Saraki was lying through his teeth. Where was Saraki in 2013 when cattle rustling started in Kaduna and Plateau States and scores were being killed? Where was he in 2014 when Benue(Agatu) experienced the worst bloodletting in their history at a time their son, David Mark, was senate president? Where was Saraki when hoodlums killed over 100 mobile policemen in a Lafia, Nasarawa State while on a mission to arrest a so-called spiritual leader of a village in 2014?
I could go on and on. But the point is not to celebrate crisis but to put the current crisis in proper perspective. It is undeniable that almost the whole of Northern Nigeria was paralyzed economically by the Boko Haram insurgency May 2015 when Buhari was sworn-in as president. Less than one year after his inauguration, the North came back to life and businesses started booming again. The recent unfortunate resurgence of Boko Haram activities cannot diminish the commendable achievement of our military and the resolve of the Buhari administration to bequeath a prosperous, secure and peaceful Nigeria to our youths.
Saraki deserves pity because his days of glory are counting out. Although it may be too early yet to conclude that the lofty narrative of a silver spoon thrust into political leadership by his father is about to end. But if the morning shows the day, we may be witnessing his tragic denouement. And nothing demonstrates the turn of events better than his unaccustomed struggles at home. He is facing continuing revolt and rejection in his home state of Kwara where he has held sway for the past 16 years, first as two-term governor and as political godfather of the current governor Abdulfatah Ahmed. He must ask himself questions about where and how he got it wrong. If he does, and is able to redeem himself, perhaps he may safe himself from the imminent political storm.
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