“I watched the dinner the PDP held and I was appalled by the fact that they gave themselves a pass mark. They were clapping and saying President Jonathan should continue.
Look, Czar Nicholas of Russia, a night before the Russian Revolution, clapped for himself. This thing happens all the time. Hitler, a night before the Russian knocked on the bunker and he had to kill himself, also clapped for himself. Don’t expect the ruling party, which has lost touch with reality and has become delusioned to score itself in an equitable and fair way. If it is out of 100, they will score themselves 110 over 100. I challenge them to tell us what they have done to improve on what happened up till 2007. Every single sector has degenerated and the facts and figures are there. We now have 80 per cent graduate unemployment, 70 per cent of Nigerians living below the poverty line. In power generation, we were hitting 4,500 megawatts per day in 2007. Today, we are lower than that.
In terms of foreign reserves, in 2007, we had $47 billion. Today, I think we have $45 billion. It has not progressed, despite all the crude oil sales. The Excess Crude Account, in 2007, was $24 billion; today, we have $7 billion. If we talk of foreign debts, a very important thing, in 2007, we had zero per cent foreign debts; today, we are back to $9 billion and still borrowing..
So, what are they celebrating? Five years later, we have gone backwards; we have not progressed. First of all, look at your foundation. Have you built on it? The answer is no. They have a foundation, a legacy which was a pretty good one.
Whether you like former President Olusegun Obasanjo or not, if you look at his performance, it was excellent. The record speaks for itself. What did they do with it? Did they build on it? No! Everything has degenerated since then. I cannot be impressed with that and so we need a change. Let’s have new people in government,” Femi Fani-Kayode 2013
