The Special Assistant on Public Communications to the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, Atiku Abubakar, Phrank Shaibu, has described President Bola Tinubu’s plan to hand out N8,000 to 12 million households for six months as a brazen attempt to divert public funds.
Shaibu said in a statement on Thursday that Tinubu’s plan to spend $800 milslion on palliatives under an opaque arrangement was reminiscent of former President Muhammadu Buhari’s conditional cash transfer and COVID-19 intervention initiative which saw politicians keeping food items and provisions in their homes while the poor went hungry.
He said Buhari’s interventionist programmes only ended up making Nigerians poorer as shown in reports released by the National Bureau of Statistics.
Atiku’s aide stated, “After announcing the removal of petrol subsidy without proper planning, Tinubu has asked for the approval of a $800m loan which he claims will be disbursed to 12 million households for six months at N8,000 for each household per month.
According to statistics, a Nigerian household as of 2019 counted an average of 5.06 members. So, with Tinubu’s uninspiring plan, each individual in a household will get N1,600 per month or N53 per day. What should they do with it?
“Use the money to buy a sachet (pure) water or a cup of boiled groundnut on a daily basis? And this is the man they claim transformed the economy of Lagos State? This must be a joke or a more sinister attempt to divert public funds.
Shaibu argued that Tinubu lacked a clear economic policy apart from taxing Nigerians.
He said having deceptively attained presidential power, Tinubu has been exposed as an economic illiterate.
Atiku’s aide stated, “Tinubu boasted that he would ‘develop Nigeria’s economy’ like that of Lagos but this was all a scam. Statistics show that over 70% of Lagos’ revenue comes from income tax paid by private companies which had been in Lagos for decades due to its status as Nigeria’s former capital.
“Tinubu promised to turn Nigeria’s economy into a $1 trillion economy but it is all a scam and can never be achieved.”
Shaibu said Tinubu ought to have focused on putting money into the agricultural sector and subsidizing production and working at attaining energy security that is the backbone of spurring desired economic growth from SMEs if he was really serious about reviving the economy.
He added, “Agriculture makes up about 30% of Nigeria’s GDP. He should have invested funds in the production aspect of agriculture and other issues affecting crop yields. The rural areas which are mostly agrarian are in the throes of insecurity. On Tinubu’s watch, over 200 people have so far been killed. However, he seems clueless about how to tackle this menace.
“The so-called palliatives that Tinubu seeks to share with the poor are just another avenue to divert public funds. For years, the Nigerian government has rejected calls to publish the list of the beneficiaries of the so-called palliatives but this has never been done because it is all a scam.
“Tinubu should stop trying to deceive Nigerians who are still suffering from the effect of his lacklustre economic policies.”
There are also concerns that this plan is a reinvention of old tricks through which the APC uses public funds as a subterfuge for vote buying.
“Let no one make any mistakes about it, the planned palliative is Trader Moni 2.0. The scheme is nothing but a means to use public funds to prosecute political campaigns and objectives.
“It is even more telling that the current imposter government is contemplating the initiative when there is a high expectation that the presidential election tribunal is set to give judgement in the controversial election that brought Tinubu into government,” he maintained.
