The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Rt Hon Yakubu Dogara, has said that the All Progressives Congress (APC) government under President Muhammadu Buhari has made commendable achievements with its anti-corruption crusade, ensuring that the meagre resources accrued to the nation are not frittered away.
According to a report by Leadership, Dogara said that even though the anti-graft war had been criticised in some quarters as being selective, he would not call all members of the APC saints but that it was the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) that had been in government for the last 16 years, adding that it was most of the persons who peopled the party that had to answer questions bordering on corruption.
The Speaker said this when he spoke to journalists shortly after ringing the bell for commencement of stocks trading at the Nigeria Stock Exchange (NSE) in Lagos.
He said: “I would say that a lot has been spoken about the fight against corruption, which is very important to ensure that the meagre resources that we have are not frittered away.
“Even though we can’t claim that all the members of APC are saints, you pointed out that APC spent money in the course of the campaign, but where did this money come from? Because as it is, we haven’t really had any facts about government officials forwarding money to the cause of the campaign. Majority of the money that was stolen was channeled towards the PDP campaign.
“You will recall that the PDP has been in power for a number of years, more than a decade, and if you were to weigh members of opposition that are in government now and had opportunity to serve, those that would have tendencies to engage in pilfering of resources, majority will come from PDP, except we are not being realistic.”
Speaker Dogara, who noted that the magnitude of the fight against graft may be weighing down the anti-agencies, however, advised them to remain focused in order to be able to do the job well.
“I guess part of the problem we have is that the scale of the problem far outweighs the anticipation of the agencies. So, if care is not taken in the process, we may not get things right.
They will have to keep their heads level to be able to be in charge of this fight and to do it effectively.”
__________
Follow us on Twitter at @thesignalng
Copyright 2015 SIGNAL. Permission to use portions of this article is granted provided appropriate credits are given to www.signalng.com and other relevant sources.
