A chieftain of the pan-Yoruba socio-political group, Afenifere, Mr Kole Omololu, has said the short stay of President Bola Tinubu in office has shown signs of outperforming former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s record.
Omololu said in a statement on Sunday that the emerging gains of the president’s recent economic reforms gave hope that the country indicated a trajectory of recovery, growth, and development.
Reacting to the claim by Obasanjo at the weekend that Nigeria had become a failing state under President Tinubu, Omololu said the former president was incorrect given the increasing gains being made under the president.
Delivering a keynote address at the Chinua Achebe Leadership Forum, Yale University, New Haven, at the weekend in Connecticut, USA, Obasanjo said pervasive corruption, mediocrity, immorality, misconduct, mismanagement, perversion, injustice, incompetence, and all other forms of iniquity confirmed Nigeria’s failing state status under the Tinubu presidency.
“The failing state status of Nigeria is confirmed and glaringly indicated and manifested for every honest person to see through the consequences of our pervasive corruption, mediocrity, immorality, misconduct, mismanagement, perversion, injustice, incompetence, and all other forms of iniquity,” he said in his recorded lecture titled: Leadership Failure and State Capture in Nigeria.
However, Omololu said Obasanjo’s conclusions were inaccurate and mischief from the former president’s habitual attention-seeking.
“This is typical Obasanjo grandstanding. As the late President Shehu Shagari wrote about him in his autobiography, ‘Beckoned To Serve,’ Obasanjo is an egotistical narcissist who cannot stand not being the centre of attention and the cynosure of all eyes. He will engage in serial acts of incitement to attract the spotlight to himself,” he stated.
Noting that Obasanjo had persistently criticised his successors unduly, Omololu contended that Tinubu’s managerial, moral and anti-corruption records were shoulder above the former president’s.
The Afenifere chieftain said the president’s economic reforms, including the withdrawal of petrol subsidies and the unification of foreign exchange rates, were bold measures the former president did not have the courage to take while in office.
He said these measures had shored up the nation’s revenue and helped it to reduce its debt service ratio from 92% to 64% of income within 17 months.
He added that Nigeria, under Tinubu, had achieved a new record in its trade balance, with an unprecedented ₦14.07 trillion trade surplus by half-year 2024, pointing out that the administration’s non-oil revenue in one quarter was more than the total generated during Obasanjo’s eight years in office.
Omololu queried: “How can President Obasanjo talk of mismanagement when, on Thursday, March 28, 2024, the Nigerian Stock Exchange crossed 104,562.06 All Shares Index, a 39.84% increase year-to-date, making it the second-best performing exchange in Africa?
He also disputed the former president’s assessment of the president’s anti-corruption record, stating that the top global transparency rating agency, Transparency International, reported a more positive evaluation.
“Transparency International says Nigeria is less corrupt today than during the Obasanjo administration,” he said, adding, “Nigeria improved on TI’s Corruption Perception Rating this year, moving five places from 150 in 2023 to 145 in 2024. In contrast, under Obasanjo, Nigeria was rated the second-most corrupt nation in the world, with only Bangladesh ahead of us in 2002. Out of 102 nations, Nigeria was number 101.”
Omololu pointed out that Obasanjo and his deputy, Atiku Abubakar, publicly exposed themselves via a nasty public exchange exposing their dirty dealings.
He stated: “President Obasanjo was personally named in the international corruption probe into the Halliburton scandal as demanding and receiving bribes. His own anti-corruption czar said that his eight years in office were worse than General Abacha’s five years.”
