Former minister of Petroleum, Prof Tam David-West, has in an interview with Daily Sun, shielded the Buhari administration from the allegations of being responsible for the current economic hardship facing the nation, saying that the economy was destroyed before President Buhari came in. He accused the past administration of Goodluck Jonathan of being wasteful and responsible for the nation’s woes.
Speaking on the economy, he said, "Everybody knows that the nation’s economy is bad and that people are suffering. However, when I listen to some of the things that people say, I shudder. I am not making apology for Buhari but we all know that he is not the cause of the problems that we have today. All of us know that it is easier to destroy than to build. Were they not there when what happened under President Goodluck Jonathan were happening. The amount of money that you hear in people’s accounts are unbelievable.
"President Buhari did not know that things were as bad as these. Nigeria was going bankrupt. Our Naira is weak because we have borrowed foreign money to back it up. The last administration was very wasteful and withdrawing money as they liked, and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) was used like the ATM by the government. They were withdrawing money not to better the economy but for the 2015 general elections. With what happened, it would take some time to build Nigeria.
"The nation’s economy was destroyed before President Buhari’s administration came in."
On restructuring he said, "The call for restructuring is evil and timid. What they want is to break up Nigeria. What are they saying and what is restructuring? If things are so bad, why are you celebrating it?
"We just celebrated 100 years of Nigeria’s existence. So, why the call for restructuring? Are you celebrating something that you want to restructure?
"So, to me, it is just hypocrisy and timidity. It is not about physical restructuring. We should love the country and restructure our selves.
"You say the country is not good and we should restructure. If you make every family a state, there would still be some people in the family that would say they are not being well treated. So, the issue is not about restructuring but having the right orientation about what Nigeria is."
