Buhari To Critics: My Achievements Speak For Me

 

 

To many Nigerians who are too critical of the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari, the man in charge himself has this to tell Nigerians that his achievements are there to speak for him.

While speaking through the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed at the two-day Nigeria Governor’s Forum, NGF, Conference, NGF, for media handlers of state governors in Abuja on Monday, President Buhari took pains to place the facts down and explained what his government has achieved since he assumed power in 2015.

PM EXPRESS quoted a report from Premium Times that the President listed his administration’s achievements in ending subsidy and “yet ensuring the availability of petroleum products; in raising power generation, transmission and distribution, in the massive provision of infrastructure; in tackling insecurity and making a success of the agriculture revolution.”

FUEL SUPPLY
“Those who accused this administration of ‘propaganda and lies’ in the fuel supply sector, for example, did not tell Nigerians that whereas they paid between 800 billion and 1.3 trillion Naira as’ subsidy’ yearly in their time, without making the products available even at regulated prices, this administration is not paying any subsidy, yet all products are currently available at competitive prices and fuel queues are now history. In their time, they paid subsidy of 3.7 billion Naira daily in 2011; 2.2 billion Naira daily in 2012 and 2013, and 2.5 billion Naira daily in 2014, all for products that were never available.”

POWER SUPPLY
“Those who accused this government of ‘propaganda and lies’ also said we have not achieved anything in the power sector. Comment is free, facts are sacred, as they say. When this Administration assumed office on 29 May 2015, available power on the grid totalled 2,690MW, transmission capacity was around 5,000MW and distribution capacity was 4,000MW. As at 4 September 2017, the available power that can be put on the grid was 6,619MW; the transmission capacity was simulated at 6,700 MW (up from 5,000 MW in 2015) but the distribution capacity was 4,600 MW, which was what was put on the grid. On September 12, 2017, production of power reached an all-time level of 7,001MW.”

DEBT PAYMENT TO LOCAL CONTRACTORS
“Massive debts owed to contractors are being settled so they can recall workers who were laid off and re-open closed work sites. As a matter of fact, during the implementation of the 2016 budget, we paid 103 construction companies executing 192 projects, and they, in turn, employed 17,749 people directly and 52,000 people indirectly in works. So far this year, 47.169 billion Naira has been paid to 62 contractors working on 149 projects to continue work on roads and bridges and keep people at work. Similar payments are being made to supervising consultants and to contractors in Housing and Power Sectors of the Ministry.”

ECONOMIC GROWTH
“Inflation has now fallen for the eighth consecutive month; that foreign exchange reserves are up to $32 billion, from $24 billion a year ago: that oil production is at nearly 2 million barrels per day and that Home-grown School Feeding Programme now being implemented in 17 States is benefiting more than 3 million public primary school children and more than 30,000 cooks across 20,000 schools”.

EMPOWERMENT

Close to 200,000 youth are benefiting from the N-Power Programme, which recruits unemployed graduates to work as teachers, agricultural extension workers, and health extension workers. Government Enterprise & Empowerment Programme (GEEP) provides micro-credit to farmers, traders, and artisans. It has in excess of 1 million beneficiaries, with women accounting for 56 per cent of that number. About $1.8 billion, the capital inflows in the second quarter of 2017 were almost double the $908 million in the first quarter.

AGRICULTURE
”If our achievements are based on ‘propaganda and lies’, as they claim, why is our agricultural revolution achieving so much success: We have commissioned the 120,000 MT per annum WACOT Rice Mill in Argungu, Kebbi State. We have commissioned the 60,000 MT per annum Edo State Fertilizer Company Limited. What about the commissioning of OLAM’s 750,000 MT per annum Integrated Poultry Facility in Kaduna State? Do you know that 15 moribund Fertilizer Blending Plants have now been revived and in operation across Nigeria, under the Presidential Fertilizer Initiative, creating 50,000 direct jobs and 70,000 indirect jobs?”

SECURITY
“Today, Boko Haram has been so degraded that it lacks the capacity to carry out any organised attack, while also increasingly losing the capacity to even attack soft targets. Importantly, Boko Haram no longer holds any territory. The same vigour is being used to address the herdsmen-farmers’ clash, kidnapping for ransom and other crimes. ”