A former governor of Benue State and serving senator of the
Federal Republic, George Akume, has fired back at those criticizing President
Muhammadu Buhari for failing to deliver on his campaign promises.
Akume said anyone who is saying Buhari has achieved nothing
since he assumed office is either blind or too myopic to see anything good
about the current government.
The former Senate Minority Leader insisted that despite the
attacks on the president, the APC-led government has not in any way
disappointed the nation since it came on board on May 29, 2015.
The APC chieftain in an interview with Vanguard voiced his
conviction thus, “I want to say with all emphasis that APC has not disappointed
and has not failed this nation. We must recognise one fact that this government
inherited a zero economy, we started from ground zero. Some said it’s even
minus. There was nothing. We had a meeting with the president, we know what he
told us on what he had to do before they started paying salaries.
“I believe we have not disappointed Nigerians There was no
money, don’t forget that when President Olusegun Obasanjo was leaving, we had
N64 billion in foreign reserves. By the time President Muhammadu Buhari took
over, we had less than N30 billion. The economy was comatose – everything
including toothpicks were being imported and irredentist movements were all
over the place.
“We had the Boko Haram ravaging the North-East, and in the
South South, we had serious security challenges. Don’t also forget the fact
that we had serious issues of kidnapping, robbery and the rest. I don’t want to
talk about corruption. Nigerians know very well what took place in the past.”
Akume faulted the belief in some quarters that his partyman
and governor of his state, Samuel Ortom is helpless over the killings of his
kinsmen by suspected Fulani herdsmen.
He said, “Actually, I want to correct the impression you
have created that the governor is helpless. The governor is not hopeless, he’s
not helpless. The governor has taken fundamental steps as the chief security
officer of Benue State, to guarantee the security of lives and property.
“I would come to that later. But I want to state this and
very emphatically too, that there had always been a conflict between farmers
and cattle rearers, it’s something that can never be completely eliminated, but
it’s something that can be brought under control. I was a small boy in those
days, I was born in the 50s and I went to school in the 60s.”
By Ameh Comrade Godwin
