Sule Lamido, former Governor of Jigawa State, says since the All Progressives Congress (APC) calls anybody who criticizes the Muhammadu Buhari administration a ‘wailer’, then Aisha Buhari, wife of the President, is also one.
On more than one occasion, Aisha has openly criticized the Buhari administration, even threatening that she may not support her husband’s reelection bid in 2019.
Lamido, who has declared his intention to run for the presidency in 2019 under the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) even though he is still facing corruption trial alongside his sons, said it is a sign of lack of leadership for a government to mock its citizens.
He said that the APC went into government unprepared and that is why it has failed to move on from its former position as an opposition party to one that is in charge of the nation’s affairs.
“Today in Nigeria, a citizen is mocked for saying his own right about his government. When you speak, they will call you a wailing wailer,” Lamido said during an interview with Premium Times.
“Now, if people are wailing because of what they see is wrong, the government should ask, why are they wailing? Instead, they make you a laughing stock. It doesn’t make sense. It means they don’t know what leadership is.
‘When your children are crying because they are hungry, what will you do? Are you going to provide food for them or you just simply call them wailing wailers?
“They are utterly irrational and don’t know what is called leadership. They are simply sitting there on privilege, but they are thinking the government is their own right.
“When President was sick, he was taken abroad, Lai and Adesina were saying he was taking some antibiotics, he is just resting, and he is healthy, bla, bla. But when Buhari came back, he said he was sick.
“When Yar’Adua was sick, the same Lai and others were demanding for their right to know their president’s health condition, even the way he ate. But now [that] they are in the government, we are now overwhelmed with tonnes of lies.”
Lamido further said that a fraction of the money that was allegedly misappropriated in illegal award of contracts at the NNPC could have been enough to solve the problem of incessant strikes in several sectors of the economy.
“Look at the issue that billions of dollars of NNPC contract at the same time ASUU were on strike. Now, if you take just one billion dollars to our universities, it will make sense there.
“Our roads are now terrible. If you put some reasonable amount there, it will also make sense. Look at Kaduna-Kano road for goodness sake.
“The medical doctors are also screaming. If you take something out of that money meant for NNPC contract, it will be OK to stop all these strikes.
“After budgeting over N3 billion to Aso Rock clinic, they now said there is not even a syringe there.
“But they kept on saying we are wailing. Thank God Aisha Buhari is among the wailers, she now wails like me. Even APC is now equally wailing. Nigeria is now a wailing nation,” Lamido said.
“I am not in any way celebrating APC’s failure as a government, because the government is not APC personal government, it is the Nigerian government.
“That government has a duty to perform [but] unfortunately they went into the government unprepared. Because they are unprepared, that is why they must continue churning out lies to mask their failure.
“During the campaign they kept saying PDP is Boko Haram, we are evil, and we were demonised. Now they are in government, they failed to move away from a political party seeking position to a party as an institution and a government.
“But because they have no simple sense of what is known as government and governance, they kept on with the same propaganda.”