* 'It’s Time To Do The Work You Were Elected For'.... PDP Govs Tells President
By Celestine Okafor (Editor-in-Chief) @CelestineOkaf11
Amidst call at the weekend by governors elected on the platform of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to resign his job over the economic hardship in the country, Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, has said Tinubu will not resign as there was no basis to do so.
The Minister, in a statement on Sunday evening, February 18, 2024 by his Special Assistant on Media, Mr Rabiu Ibrahim, described the statement by the PDP Governors Forum, directing a call for the resignation of President Bola Tinubu as sheer frivolity and an attempt cause public distraction by leaders who are constitutionally bound to help resolve the nation's problems.
While dismissing such call as vile political opportunism designed to grandstand in the public sphere, the statement also said the opposition PDP and the party's governors were attempting to seek "through the back door of intimidation, what they have consistently failed to achieve by democratic means, since 2015".
The minister reasoned that what was required of the PDP governors at this uneasy times in the country was a collective and patriotic effort to support the President and his administration's bid to bring economic relief to the Nigerian people.
Idris further fired more broadsides at the offending opposition governors thus: "Those who could not bring transformational change when they had a lengthy chance to do so, should not seek to interrupt or distract those who are busy at work on the presidential vision that Nigerians elected them to implement.
"The administration of President Bola Tinubu has also, since inception, generously extended financial support to all the State Governments, regardless of partisan affiliation. In addition, the removal of the petrol subsidy—which, incidentally, was one of the main planks of the PDP presidential campaign—has swelled the revenues of all States, including the PDP States. To whom more has been given, more is therefore expected.
"The President and his administration recognise the unfinished business of revamping our national economy kickstarted by the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari, through programmes focused on large-scale infrastructure, social welfare, prioritizing the equipping and welfare of the military and security agencies, and reclaiming Nigeria’s strategic place in the comity of nations.
"Boko Haram and its affiliates, on the ascendancy in 2014/2015, have since been decimated, and similar bold gains are now being made with bandits and other criminals.
"Nigerians have not forgotten that it was the APC administration that cleared several liabilities left behind by the PDP government, such as subsidy claims by oil marketers, Paris Club Refunds, unpaid pensions, gratuities, and salary arrears owed various categories of pensioners from liquidated and existing State-Owned Enterprises.
"Major oil sector reforms that the PDP touted for years but could not deliver – passage of the PIB, new refineries, as well as the revamp of existing ones, and so on – are the very real and continuing legacies of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
"All of these have been accomplished without access to the oil windfall that the PDP government enjoyed for much of the time that it was in power, and also against the backdrop of the most devastating global shock since the Second World War: the COVID-19 pandemic.
"We must continue to state these facts so Nigerians will know where we are coming from, and appreciate what is being done in its full context.
"President Tinubu is not and will never be overwhelmed by the current challenges the country is facing. He will not abdicate his responsibilities. He will courageously continue to wrestle with the challenges and surmount them, laying a durable foundation for the new Nigeria that is emerging.
"He has also never shied away from acknowledging the pain of ongoing reforms, and has seized every opportunity to assure Nigerians that inside the pain of the reforms lie the seeds of lasting prosperity and national development.
"To the PDP Governors, let us reiterate: This is not the time for distraction. It is time instead for the rolling up of sleeves, to support and complement the hard work of the President and his administration". NNL.
