Junaid Mohammed, a Nigerian lawmaker in the second republic, has asserted that Muhammadu Buhari, the president of Nigeria, barely read two pages of an economics book he bought for Buhari during the preparation for the presidential election in 2015.
The former lawmaker in an interview with Vanguard Newspaper on Saturday, February 17, 2018 also accused the president of lack of competence in handling the affairs of the nation.
“I suggested the idea of a think tank to Buhari and he agreed and he put together a think tank with quite a number of formidable brains and started meeting in 2015 until I stopped coming. I suggested a number of books for all of us to read and those books were procured. One of the books I recommended to Buhari personally, because it has to do with economic matters especially in dealing with the World Bank and the IMF group, was a book written by a Nobel prize laureate in economics, Joseph Stiglitz,” he said.
“Buhari took the book and opened it, just wrote GMB on it and that was all. Over a year later when I came I found that Buhari had not read two pages out of that book. To me, that is a very dangerous leadership position.”
Dr. Mohammed said unlike President Buhari, former President Olusegun Obasanjo and Ibrahim Babangida, a former head of state, are good readers who listen to advice.
“I am scared of a leader who does not read and who does not look for experts, and I don’t believe any leader no matter how distinguished, who claims and believes that only his own people have all the knowledge in every subject matter in the world; this is a very dangerous attribute Buhari has.”
The Northern politician accused President Buhari of nepotism, saying; “This man has a penchant for appointing his relations, his friends and what have you into key positions. And given the general disappointment that he has caused Nigerians and the failure of his administration to rein in graft, it is not possible that Nigerians can massively vote for him as they did in 2015. I think it would be utterly irrational for them to vote for him again”.
The man, who supported President Buhari’s campaign, stated that the visit of some northern governor to the president last week does not represent the decision of all northerners.
He went further to add that the North should not expect to be handed presidency come 2019, instead, he opined that the northern must work hard “as every other part of the country” if the highest seat in the country would be occupied by the North.
“Well while watching the television, I saw some Northern names and I saw a couple of Kano names and both seemed to be speaking on an agenda which they claimed to be a Northern agenda. I was born in Kano, I grew up in Kano and after my overseas training, I came back to settle in Kano. I don’t believe anybody who attended the meeting can claim to have attended that meeting on behalf of Kano people because we have a history of making our mind and doing our own thing politically, and that is why we started opposition politics in this country from 1950. The Kano man I knew those days as I was growing up is still the Kano man I know today,” he said.
Asked what he would advise the president if he got an opportunity to speak with him immediately, he said: “I would advise Buhari to go to a retire home so as to be able to take care of his health and his family. Secondly, I would ask him to investigate and ask all those who made humongous fortunes out of his administration to go and render account how they came about such stupendous wealth.”
“Tell all your relatives and their in-laws and what have you, who have gotten to important positions in NNPC, ministry of finance, ministry of power and steel and what have you and those who got huge contracts to go and render how they came about the contracts because if the contracts did not follow due process, they should be made to vomit what they swallowed like python.”
“I would also tell him that economics is a subject matter for which he must have the aptitude and the knowledge. I would make it plain to him that if he does not have economists to run the country, he should go and bring them from wherever they are, whether from the south, from the sea, from IMF, World Bank to come and put the economy right for the overall interest of all Nigerians. Without a sound economy, there can be no Nigeria.”
“Finally, I would tell Buhari that he has failed the nation and that he should give room for others to come and try.”
