President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has come under fire from former vice president Atiku Abubakar, who has accused him of political desperation, hypocrisy, and purposeful misrepresentation of Nigeria’s economic past.
Atiku called the President’s latest comments a “reckless tirade” that reveals “a troubling pattern of hypocrisy and historical amnesia” in a statement released on his behalf by Phrank Shaibu, his Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication.
The statement said it was shocking that a sitting president who was being questioned about his own qualifications would try to defame others using what it called verifiable public service records.
“Atiku Abubakar’s attention has been drawn to the latest reckless tirade by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, a performance that exposes not just desperation but a troubling pattern of hypocrisy and historical amnesia,” the text stated.
Conflict over Privatization Policy
Atiku’s team contended that Tinubu’s objections of the controversial privatization issue are unpersuasive, pointing out that the President has purportedly opposed such reforms in the past.
The statement alleged that Tinubu had opposed Atiku’s repeated calls for the privatization of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation and the selling of refineries to reliable private investors.
However, the statement claimed that an opaque version of the same strategy was being implemented by the current administration.
According to the statement, the government is currently in charge of a system that has successfully commercialized the national oil firm “without clear valuation, without transparency, and with lingering questions about who truly benefits.”
The statement said, “This is privatization without accountability; it is not reform.”
The camp of the former vice president also defended his contribution to Nigeria’s economic changes, citing a number of businesses as products of the privatization initiative he oversaw.
Oando Plc (formerly Unipetrol), Conoil Plc, African Petroleum (now Ardova Plc), Indorama Eleme Petrochemicals, Benue Cement Company, and Transcorp Hilton Abuja were among those mentioned.
According to the statement, these policies continue to be timeless models of how to generate value and revitalize faltering government businesses.
