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All Progressives Congress (APC) Presidential Organisation has described as “Greek Gift” the PDP branded grains that were distributed by National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) to Internally Displaced Persons in some parts of the country.
The party’s Presidential Campaign Organization, which expressed disgust over what it called the federal government’s systematic destruction of state institutions, the latest of which is NEMA, said that NEMA was forced to shed its garb of a neutral by donning/branding their grains with PDP logo and Jonathan campaign slogans.
In a statement, the Director of Media and Publicity of the Campaign Organization, Garba Shehu, accused the federal Government of re-bagging all the grains at the nation’s strategic grain reserves, paid for with public resources in PDP colours and Jonathan campaign slogans ahead of issuance to the public.
“When will this regime and its exponents stop deceiving Nigerians and betraying the people’s confidence hitherto reposed in them? Or how will they explain the rationale behind the collusion between the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) to evacuate grains from the Strategic Grains Reserve and package them in GEJ and PDP scripted branded bags, for onward distribution to IDPs in Nigeria and her immediate neighbours.
“It is in fact disgraceful and denigrating to our national image to hear that the Nigerian IDPs in Diffa village in Chad had turned down the political Greek gift of rice, maize and millets; instead they have asked the President to live up to his Commander in Chief status to reclaim their homeland and create a secure atmosphere for them to return home, to their familiar terrain where they can fend for themselves, rather than being reduced to the penury of forced refugees and beggars on dole-out in a foreign country.”
Garba Shehu said that the belated food gesture to IDPs is yet another fraudulent political gimmick and crass opportunism by an incumbent government that is deploying state apparatus for polls advantage, even at the expense of both the beneficiaries and the national treasury.
He called for the preservation of the integrity and sanctity of state institutions, saying that without these pillars, the superstructure of the state cannot be kept in place.
“These institutions predated the president and long after he is gone, these institutions must remain in the service of the people.” [myad]
