Former Deputy National Chairman, South of the Labour Party (LP), Comrade Calistus Uju Okafor has dismissed the purported third term agenda for President Muhammadu Buhari as nothing but propaganda of the opposition parties.
Okafor who disclosed this in a chat with newsmen in Lagos on Wednesday recalled that during the last presidential election campaign, President Buhari made it clear that he was not going to seek third term in office as President neither was he going to discuss about it.
He said, “Everybody knows President Muhammadu Buhari, he is a gentleman, he is a man of honour, a man of integrity. I also listened to him during the last National Executive Council meeting of the APC. In that meeting, during his speech, he made it clear that there is nothing like third term and he did not stop at that, he went as far as telling his party members to read their constitution because if they had read their constitution, nobody will be talking about third term. There is no such thing as third term in our constitution.
“Mr. President is a man I respect so much, he is a man I believe in his governance so much, people may try to lure him into that but I assure you that he is not a man that can do that. For me, it is PDP propaganda.”
When reminded that a member of the APC had approached the court pleading with it to set aside some sections of the constitution to enable President Buhari seek another term in office, Comrade Okafor retorted, “like I said, you heard him during the National Executive Council meeting of the APC which is the highest decision making body of the APC, he said that people should read their constitution, that there is nothing like third term agenda. Honestly, Buhari is not Obasanjo, Obasanjo is the only person we have seen in this country that talked about third term, sponsored it and it failed and I don’t think any right thinking human being again can talk about third term, nobody, not even President Muhammadu Buhari.”
On the Transportation University sited at President Muhammadu Buhari’s home town, Daura in Katsina state, the former Labour Party Deputy National Chairman stated that President Muhammadu Buhari is the President of Nigeria, he is not the Minister of Transport and by the constitution, Minister of Transport has the right even to take the Transport University to his (Amaechi) own village”, adding that “I want you to know that his own village in Rivers is among the components of this country, so, that University must be sited somewhere, anywhere in this country.”
He continued, “So, taking it to Daura shouldn’t be a problem or news. I say again that all these issues are raised by the opposition party especially the PDP. I believe that when you want to do criticism concerning government, do a constructive criticism not something that is meaningless. Let me give you an instance, Ota Farm was taken to Ogun State by Obasanjo, today, if you ask anybody who owns Ota Farm, he will quickly tell you that Ota Farm is owned by the former President Obasanjo but that Ota Farm was built with Nigeria’s money. So, why is building University in Daura raising a lot of dusts?
“Daura is among the components of Nigeria, for one Nigeria, any investment for the good of Nigerians can be done anywhere. Look at the second Niger Bridge; is President Muhammadu Buhari from South East? But look at the second Niger Bridge going on. For me, peoples should stop raising issue where there is none.”
Speaking on the border closure, he quickly dismissed the claim that it was citizens of Togo, Benin Republic and Ghana were showing displeasure with the closure even as he argued that it was rather Nigerian citizens who were importing from those countries that were not comfortable with the border closure.
In his words, “On the issue of the border closure, I read everything in the news; Togo, Cotonou, Ghana, how all these people are crying but remember, these people that are crying, it is not really them that are crying, it is our own people that are importing from those areas that are really crying. What we are passing through today, countries like Malaysia, Singapore, India have passed through it.”
On the additional request by the President to the National Assembly for an approval to borrow an additional $30 billion, he said, “Every country that wants to get it right had to borrow because if you borrow, you have to invest it into infrastructure and we have seen that in agriculture, they are doing very well, in transportation, they are doing very well, in works, they are doing very well. We can see a lot of roads under construction, at least, the one that concerns me, this Lagos-Ibadan road, you can see that work is ongoing there. Do you know how many years that road has been like that? Since PDP took over power in 1999, that road has been like that. You can see the quality of work that is going on.
“Look at the Apapa road, look at the Airport Road, if you land in this country now, you can see how beautiful this country is. If you are coming to Apapa from Oshodi, you will see the quality of work going on there. That is where these monies that they are borrowing are going. We Igbos, we so much loved Jonathan; can anyone point to any project and say this is what Jonathan did for the Igbos, even for the entire southern region? Nothing! He said he will build the second Niger Bridge for us; did it happen in his own time? Go there now; you can see that work is seriously going on. You don’t need Microscope to see what is happening, you can see the volume of infrastructure going on in this country today.”
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