BEVERLY HILLS, February 16, (THEWILL) – President Muhammadu Buhari has revealed that Nigeria expects a lot from Britain in her rebuilding process, due to the affinity shared by the two countries.
Receiving a team of British Members of Parliament led by Hon Chi Onwurah at State House, Abuja, Tuesday, President Buhari declared: “We are going to rebuild Nigeria, and there are vast opportunities for Britain and us. We share very close ties, and our expectation from you is high.”
According to Femi Adesina, Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, the president lamented that Nigeria had found herself in a phase of development, “which is not a very welcome one. We are disorganized because we relied on mono-economic product for too long, and now that oil price is down, we have to go back to agriculture and solid minerals.
“Tin, columbite, cocoa, groundnut, and others, used to be the basis of our economy, but then, oil came, and everybody began to look for cheap money. Now, we need to start all over again.”
Hon. Onwurah, Nigerian-born MP for Newcastle, said the team was in the country “to promote positive engagement between Nigeria and the UK, since we are stronger when we build on ties of the past.”
She said her team was interested in how the Diaspora can support the economic progress of Nigeria, as well as promotion of trade and diversification of the economy.
Also on the delegation made up of three MPs was the British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Mr. Paul Arkwright.
Sacking Officers Is Not Enough, Withdraw The Budget, Fayose Tells Buhari
Ekiti State Governor, Mr Ayodele Fayose has said that controversies surrounding the Federal Government 2016 Budget cannot be addressed by mere sacking of the Director General of the Budget Office of the Federation and appointing a new one, insisting that the budget must be withdrawn from the National Assembly and a new and error free one represented.
In a release issued by his Special Assistant on Public Communications and New Media, Lere Olayinka, Fayose declared that what the controversial 2016 budget required was a holistic approach, not just making one person scapegoat.
He maintained that padding of the budget with strange figures, now being denied by Ministers was a clear intention to steal in advance, adding that; “Though it is good that the President listened to my call for the punishment of those responsible for the national embarrassment, mere sacking of officers at the Budget Office will not remove the stain splashed on Nigeria by the shameful budget.”
“Sacking one or two persons on this budget scam is just like using some people as cover-up for the national embarrassment caused by the President himself. Even the President himself signed a letter wrongly dated as October 22, 2016 and one is tempted to ask who the President will sack for these avoidable errors.
“Or was it the sacked DG of Budget Office the one who unilaterally put all those bogus figures like N3.8 billion for Aso Villa Clinic, N780 million for website in one single ministry, and others in the budget?
“In my own opinion, it is necessary that those handling the President should bring it to his consciousness that he is not God that cannot make mistakes and this budget scam must be seen as part of the mistakes that President Buhari is capable of making.
“By doing this, the President will be provided with another opportunity to re-present the Budget because I wonder how Nigeria can operate on a budget already disowned by notable ministers, including the government’s spokesperson.
“Or what remedy can anyone do to a budget in which 2015 budgetary allocations of an agency was reproduced verbatim? Even N180 million was discovered to have been allocated to NIMET twice.”
Governor Fayose, who also queried the request by the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed for a “special funding arrangement for public media organizations to enable them to scale up their sensitization campaign against insurgency in the North-East,” said Nigerians need further explanations as to why special fund will be needed on Boko Haram that he (Lai Mohammed) said had already been defeated.
“What they told us was that they have technically defeated Boko Haram. What then do they need special fund for? Even last year, there was no such special fund. To my mind, there could be more to this clamour for special fund for media on ‘already defeated’ Boko Haram than meet the eyes.”
Story by David Oputah
