Atiku’s aide says Tinubu is distancing himself from APC's failure

Phrank Shaibu, a special assistant on Public Communication to the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, Atiku Abubakar, says Bola Tinubu, the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) is trying to dissociate himself from the ‘failure’ of President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration.

He said it’s disingenuous for Tinubu to criticise the administration he’s been vigorously defending since 2015.

Shaibu said this in a statement on Wednesday, February 1, 2023, while reacting to Tinubu’s latest comment on President Buhari’s administration at the Calabar rally.

Quoting Tinubu, the special adviser said, “Today, they moved the exchange rate from N200 to N800. If they had repaired it, if they had arrested this, we wouldn’t be where we are today, we would be greater. They don’t know the way, they don’t know how to think, they don’t know how to do it.”

Before the Calabar rally, Tinubu had also criticised the scarcity of petrol and the new naira notes across the country.

In his statement, Shaibu described Tinubu as a user, who throws his friend under the bus.

He said the latest outburst of the APC presidential candidate is nothing but diversionary tactics.

He said: “Tinubu has disingenuously been criticising President Buhari, trying to extricate himself from the failures of the APC which he had vigorously defended in the last eight years. Nigerians must not be deceived by this charlatan who is now posing to be on the side of the masses.

“It is funny that Tinubu, who proudly held the position of national leader of the APC for the last eight years, could throw the President under the bus in his failed and desperate quest for power.

“Tinubu is the APC, mind, soul and body. He was the national leader of the party even before Buhari became the presidential candidate. Is it possible for a snail to deny its own shell? Tinubu needs to give up this rascally act and take ownership of the failure of his party in the last eight years. His latest outburst is nothing but diversionary tactics.

“This is the sort of person Tinubu is. He is a user who throws his friends under the bus when things get tough. Nigerians have been facing petrol scarcity for nearly a year. Why is Tinubu just speaking about it now that elections are a few days away?

“Why is Tinubu just attacking Buhari’s policies, many of which have been in place for years? In any case, the previous Finance Minister, Kemi Adeosun, said at the 65th Tinubu symposium on March 28, 2017, that it was Tinubu’s economic policy that the Buhari regime was using. So, why is Tinubu all of a sudden trying to distance himself from his own failed policy?”

Shaibu wondered why Tinubu did not speak up when his ‘godsons’ Ahmed Lawan, the Senate President, and Femi Gbajabiamila, the Speaker of the House of Representatives approved all of Buhari’s loans which he said have weakened the currency.

He also asked where Tinubu was when the Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo, who was a commissioner under him for eight years in Lagos was making policies about the country’s economy.