PDP to Osinbajo: Stop Misleading Nigerians over Nation’s Economy

by Lateef Ibrahim  

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has accused the Vice- President-elect, Prof. YemiOsinbajo of misrepresenting facts regarding the nation’s economy particularly, the correct status of the nation’s government debt stock.
Osinbajo, the PDP maintained, was embarking on the misrepresentation of fact ostensibly to further the attempts by the in-coming All Progressives Congress (APC) administration to discredit the PDP.
Its National Publicity Secretary, MaziOlisaMetuh, on Monday, flayed the Vice-President-elect for failing to be bold and honest enough to also inform the nation that the bulk of the $63.7 billion debt was incurred by APC states.
According to Metuh: “It is, indeed, unfortunate that the Vice-President-elect, who has the details of the debt stock, chose to be economical with the truth and to mislead Nigerians just to discredit the current PDP-led administration and rationalise APC’s unpreparedness for governance.
“Prof. Osinbajo is aware that the $63.7 billion is made up of external and domestic debts belonging not only to the Federal Government but, also, state governments and had been accumulating since the 1960s, yet he deliberately misrepresented the facts to give the unsuspecting public the impression that the amount was exclusively incurred by the current Federal Government.
“Perhaps, the Vice-President-elect avoided the details, so as not to expose the fact that the APC-controlled Lagos state has both the highest external debt stock of $1.169 billion, as well as the highest domestic debt stock of N278. 867 billion.”
“Furthermore, we find it unacceptable and unstatesmanly for the Vice President-elect to attempt to mislead Nigerians into believing that the total federal debt component was accumulated under the President Goodluck Jonathan-led administration, when it is on record that a greater chunk of the amount was inherited.”
Berating the in-coming administration for dwelling on excuses and reneging on campaign promises, the PDP wondered if the APC and the President-elect, General Muhammadu Buhari did not know about the economic challenges caused by the dwindling oil revenues before making their bogus promises to Nigerians.