CNPP joins bandwagon
Laments harsh economic realities in Nigeria
BY MAYOWA SAMUEL
The calls for the impeachment of President Muhammadu Buhari got more converts on Thursday with the Conference of Nigerian Political Parties endorsing the calls.
This time, the umbrella body for all political parties in Nigeria predicated its support for Buhari’s impeachment on the donation of vehicles worth N1.14 billion to neighbouring Niger Republic.
The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, shortly after Wednesday’s Federal Executive Council meeting, confirmed that President Buhari approved the purchase and donation of the vehicles to Niger Republic.
According to Ahmed, the gesture was to aid Niger in the acquisition of some operational vehicles to address its security challenges.
The minister argued that although Nigerians had the right to question the rationale for such donation, Buhari, who approved the purchase, also has the right to make his own assessment of situations and act accordingly.
The National Assembly to waste no time in impeaching the President for funding a foreign country under the guise of improvements in her security logistics but failed to tackle insecurity at home.
But while expressing its dissatisfaction at the government’s gesture, the CNPP, in a statement signed by its Secretary-General, Willy Ezugwu on Thursday, called on the National Assembly to immediately impeach the president.
The CNPP urged “the National Assembly to waste no time in impeaching the President for funding a foreign country under the guise of improvements in her security logistics but failed to tackle insecurity at home, seeing that the vehicles in question were not security patrol vans but executive SUV jeeps.
“The six weeks ultimatum issued to Mr. President to tackle internal security should be cut short immediately as the Senate must now reconvene as a matter of urgency to commence the impeachment proceedings without further delay.
“Secondly, at the height of insecurity in the country, a contract to supply the 10 units of Toyota Land Cruisers was awarded while the Nigerian police lack operational vehicles and other necessary equipment to carry out internal security operations.
“Today, the military, which traditionally has no business with internal security, has been drafted to deal with ordinary unarmed protesters when we have police units that were trained to manage riotous crowds in a civil manner.
“Despite the harsh economic realities in Nigeria, the President is also funding the economic interests of the same foreign entity through the $1.96 billion 284km rail project connecting Kano in Nigeria to Maradi in Niger Republic.
“The CNPP, therefore, calls on all Nigerians to take note of the level of insensitivity and maladministration of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) Federal Government and do the needful in 2023 as the country cannot survive another eight years of an APC government from next year”, the statement added.
Also, this is coming amidst the nationwide strike embarked upon by the Academic Staff Union of Universities since February 14, to press home its demands for a better welfare package, revamping of the nation’s education sector, among others, a situation which has forced many Nigerian students to be at home.
The minority caucus in the Senate had called for the impeachment of the President before it went on break. The caucus gave President Buhari six weeks to deal with the issue of insecurity which has recently spiked so dangerously that the Federal Capital Territory, once regarded as a safe haven, has come under attack many times.
