Our criticisms not attack on Jonathan, APC replies PDP

All Progressives Congress (APC) has reacted to claims by Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) that the opposition’s com­ments on the performance of the Federal Govern­ment were a personal at­tack on President Good­luck Jonathan.
In a statement made avail­able to newsmen on Tues­day and entitled: “Enough is Enough,” National Public­ity Secretary of PDP, Olisa Metuh, had warned that the party would no longer tolerate scathing views about the Fed­eral Government, saying they amounted to a personal attack on the president.
But speaking with newsmen in Abuja, National Publicity Secretary of the main opposi­tion party, Lai Mohammed, said the APC always attacked the policies and actions of President Jonathan, and not his person.

Mohammed said: “Every Nigerian has now seen what we have been talking about. But believe me, we are not just being harsh on this gov­ernment, but as long as this government continues with no fresh ideas, the economy can only get worse.
“Now, has anybody ever insulted Mr. President except talk about his policies? If l says this government is clueless; l am not talking personal, I am only saying that the govern­ment has no clear policy of the economy. I am saying that this government cannot tackle in­surgency. I am saying that this government has been unable to provide employment. I am stating the facts.”
The APC spokesperson also expressed concern over the of­ficial devaluation of the naira against the dollar by the Cen­tral Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
Mohammed told newsmen that his party alerted the Fed­eral Government on the danger of running a mono-cultural economy, with the attendant illegal oil bunkering, but la­mented that its admonition was dismissed by the Jonathan ad­ministration.
His words: “You know, we have always warned about the calamitous economic policies of this government. I don’t know if you remember, about two years ago, we issued a statement saying with the oil and gas discovery, which has remained largely untapped in the US that it was going to threaten our oil and gas market. We went further to warn gov­ernment that cost of production of oil in Nigeria was the high­est. We raised the alarm also about the organized theft of crude oil.
“We were called alarmist. We went further to advise the government to diversify our economy; we advised govern­ment to spend more of our re­sources in finding new reserve and we gave example that while Angola and Brazil have reinvested in new deposit to about 40 per cent, Nigeria had only invested about two per cent.
“These are all the issues that we raised. Of course, again as usual, they called us opposi­tion. Now, the chicken has come back to roost. We have three problems now. First, the issue of dwindling oil prices. Two, we have the issue of our reserve, which is dwindling; even the excess crude account is dwindling.
“We are now told that we should not worry that our country is not broke; we are now told that we should not worry that the austerity mea­sures would only affect the rich. When the currency is de­valued, it is the worst thing that can happen to any nation. All it means for a country like ours, which is import dependent, you will need more naira to buy raw materials, more naira to buy machines. It also means that very soon cost of living would go up.
“But this, to me, should not have surprised anybody. If you sit down today and you hear the amount of money that has been declared missing in the economy, even if you agree that it is only $12 billion and you don’t even take Sanusi’s $20 billion, if you add $12 bil­lion to our reserve today, you know what the reserve is go­ing to be. We have the pension scam. Once you have corrup­tion it is going to affect your economy.”