27th September, 2012
The Action Congress of Nigeria has called on Nigerians to brace up for tougher times ahead as the People’s Democratic Party-led Federal Government has completely run out of ideas .
In a statement issued in Lagos on Thursday by its National Publicity Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party said that rather than address the issues raised in its criticism of the central government’s inept handling of the multiple tragedies and calamities the country is currently reeling under, the PDP has characteristically embarked on a flight of fancy and daylight hallucination.
“To accuse the Action Congress of Nigeria of politicizing national disasters and calamities when it actually only criticized President Jonathan’s lack of capacity, pro-activeness, and coordinated response to thesenatural calamities and disasters depicts the paucity of the thought process of the People’s Democratic Party -led Federal Government, ” the party said.
“How can the attempt to draw the attention of Nigerians to the inept handling of the problems confronting the country be disparaged as attention seeking? How long did it take for any minister or high ranking government official to visit the scene of the flooding for an on the spot assessment? Why would a President, just fifteen minutes away from the scene of the worst flooding ever witnessed in the country fail to visit for immediate assessment? How many days after the disaster did it take the federal government to belatedly take any action? Where are the concrete adaptation and mitigation measures to prevent a future occurrence of this disaster elsewhere in the country?
“In other saner climes where a capable president and not a trainee president is in charge, the president would have made a stop over with pronouncements about support, relief materials and expression of sympathy for the victims,” the party explained.
According to ACN, while conceding that flooding is a global phenomenon it is quite unfortunate however that despite the huge sums the country has spent on attending international conferences on the impact of climate change, the Federal Government has been unable to come up with concrete adaptation and mitigation measures to avert these disasters or respond in a co-ordinated, timely and robust manner whenever or wherever they may occur.
“The People’s Democratic Party’s response is nothing but a recklessly rabid disposition to repel at all times any criticism no matter how constructive. We are not even sure whether Olisa Metuh and his ilk read or understood the whole point made in our statement which is that only an incompetent and trainee government could have gotten Nigeria into the present mess,” the party concluded.