The National Chairman of the governing
All Progressives Congress, Chief John Odigie-Oyegun, on Monday said no
Nigerian leader could afford to exclude any part of the nation in making
appointments.
Odigie-Oyegun said this against the
backdrop of the uproar generated by recent appointments announced by
President Muhammadu Buhari.
The party chairman said this while
receiving a delegation from MBO Dynamic Support Group, led by its
national coordinator, Usman Ibrahim, who paid him a courtesy visit at
the party’s national secretariat.
The party chairman used the opportunity
to assure the group and Nigerians that knowing “the kind of a person
President Muhammadu Buhari is, he remains confident that he will balance
federal appointments across all the geopolitical zones.”
He
said appointments so far made by the President were mostly those of his
personal staff, adding that the furore over the alleged lopsidedness of
these appointments was uncalled for.
Odigie-Oyegun said, “So, one must make
that clear at this stage. Nobody, no leader can neglect any part of this
nation, that will not happen.
“There have been a lot of unfortunate
misinformation and uproar against appointments at this stage. We have
two set of appointments that have been taking place. One set are the
personal privilege of Mr. President, as far as his personal staff are
concern. The other set has to do with a few important and strategic
persons that are going to help him either in the fight against
corruption or the fight against insurgency in the North-East, but this
is not where to play the political balancing game.
“The President has the right to appoint
those he has confidence in because these are the areas where he has made
promises to Nigerians.
“But we have thousands of political
appointments and he has just made a few appointments while thousands are
still waiting. The balancing must happen when the political appointment
are being made but we must not at this particular point in time with
the few appointments say that one must be from the North, one must be
from South or from the east not at this very stage.”
He appealed to Nigerians not to lose
sight of the fact that those who were hell-bent on drawing Nigeria back
from the path of progress will stop at nothing to discredit the
Buhari-led APC administration.
Commenting on the anti-graft war embarked
upon by the administration Odigie-Oyegun said, “If a particular group
has ruled for 16 years, then who is guilty of corruption?
“And all the fight, and allegation of
witch-hunt are neither here nor there. What is important is that anybody
who has a skeleton in his cupboard is the one that has something to
fear, if you do not have any skeleton in your cupboard you go to sleep
and sleep very soundly.”
0 comments:
Post a Comment