Presidency replies PDP's attack on administration

The presidency on Saturday advised the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to stop playing down achievements so far recorded by President Muhammadu Buhari.

Read: Olisa Metuh: 'Nigeria has lost billions of Naira under Buhari,' PDP spokesman says

This is contained in a statement issued in Abuja by the president’s Senior Special Assistant, Media, Malam Garba Shehu.

Shehu said the PDP should rather bury its head in shame for subjecting Nigeria to the ``worst economic plunder through corruption’’ in its recent history.

Shehu was reacting to the statement issued by the PDP National Publicity Secretary, Olisa Metuh, that ``the economy is going down’’ under the All Progressives Congress (APC) administration.

``It is ridiculous for any sane government to artificially rebase the economy and claim to transform Nigeria into the largest economy in Africa as the PDP administration did.’’

He also said that the defeated former ruling party was artificially manipulating statistics to create the illusion of impressive economic performance record.

He said if PDP’s claim of economic successes in terms of GDP, employment generation, poverty alleviation and others were genuine, Nigerians would not have voted the party out of power.

He said if the former ruling party was doing well, the opposition parties would have found it difficult to defeat it.

``Nigerians no longer face exploitation at filling stations because the government is taking punitive measures against marketers that punish poor Nigerians.’’

He said queues had disappeared at the filling stations and the Naira was enjoying favourable exchange rate.

According to him, the present administration has successfully blocked leakages and other avenues for corruption.He said the administration had also frustrated efforts by corrupt elements to divert public funds to private pockets.

``Once the formal trial for corruption begins, the PDP might no longer have the moral legs to stand on