Atiku accuses Tinubu’s govt of exhibiting despotic traits

…says National Assembly is enabler of executive recklessness

By Tunde Opalana

Former vice president on Nigeria, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, has bemoaned what he described as high handedness of the government of President Bola Tinubu while stressing that the government is already exhibiting traits of despotism.

According to him, while in the evolution of systems of government, a major concern for thinkers was a governmental framework that will reduce the high handedness of the executive arm of government, it is unfortunate that despotic traits are becoming more visible in the Tinubu’s administration.

The presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2023 general election raised this concern in a personally signed statement made available to the media on Thursday.

Atiku said: “It was thought, and rightly so too, that a participatory approach to governance, such that will make the government derive its legitimacy from the people will better serve the interest of the masses.

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“And thus, to make sure that the executive does not go overboard in the application of its powers, the legislative arm of government was conceived as a means of protecting the people from the authoritarian tendencies of wielders of state powers.

“Regrettably, however, the democracy in Nigeria in the current administration of President Bola Tinubu has become an anathema to that general principle of democracy as providing primary protection for the people against executive excesses.

“This ugly tendency is being manifested by the steady posturing of our National Assembly, especially the Senate, of taking a reverse course in its core function and becoming a puppet in the hands of the President.

“It is uncharitable that whenever members of the Senate stand on the floor of the red chamber to perform their statutory duty of calling the executive to order, they are immediately reprimanded for doing so.

“When Senator Abdul Ningi called attention of the country to the incident of budget padding in the 2024 Appropriation bill, rather than calling for a thorough investigation into the observation, the reaction of the Senate was to hand him a suspension. Today, the people of Nigeria are victims of an ambiguous budget framework upon which appropriations for the current fiscal year are hinged in the face of multiplicity of appropriations.

“Only yesterday, Senator Ali Ndume called for the President to wake up to his responsibilities and provide succour to address the biting hunger and poverty in the country. Ironically, the response of the @NGRSenate to his patriotic warning is to relieve him of his principal office as the Chief Whip of the Senate.

“Also, despite persistent solicitations that government put its priorities on canceling the excruciating hardship in the land and suspend the idea of spending scarce resources on the purchase of new aircraft for the presidential fleet, the Senate took a stand against the people and ignored the voices of altruism by decorating the President with controversial purchases of an aircraft and a yacht amidst the worst material conditions of the average citizen in the history of our country.

“We are, therefore, beginning to see a pattern in which the National Assembly has become an enabler of executive recklessness, and the concerns of the people stand in the nadir of priority list of the legislature.

“This emerging reality must stop. The health of our democracy is being compromised by this unholy alliance between the executive and the legislature and portends a dictatorship that will worsen the lot of the people.”