Former Head of
State General Muhammad Buhari has said the fight against corruption is beyond
the capacity of President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration.
In a keynote lecture
on ‘Stable Democracy and Nigeria’s Economy’ delivered at the Houses of
Parliament in London last night, Buhari said the present government lacked the
political will to fight the rampant corruption bedevilling the country.
He also said the
Independent National Electoral Commission would not deliver on free and fair
elections, and that INEC has a “cosy relationship with the executive and the
judiciary.”
Buhari said ahead
of the 2011 elections, INEC requested and got N80 billion for elections and
biometric data, but failed to avail the litigating parties access to the data
on grounds on national security. He therefore said only the opposition, if they
are strong enough, could stop rigging in the country.
He said though
there was the need to restructure the country, “the problem with Nigeria is not
the structure but the process”, and described the clamour for more states as
“dysfunctional” and out of place.
To get out of
poverty and socio-economic quagmire in the country, he said, the government
should focus on agriculture and provide the sector with all the necessary
assistance to return the country to agricultural boom and halt the rural-urban
migration.
Earlier, the chair
of British African Development Programme, Lorraine Phelan, described Nigerians
as a hard working people who are blessed with wealth but living in poverty. She
said it was time for Nigerians to start “asking questions about and taking part
in good governance. Nigeria must succeed.”
In her remarks, the
hostess of the lecture, Diane Abbot, said Nigeria was key to Africa’s future,
stressing that Nigeria’s failure would not just be a failure of Africa, but
that of the black race as a whole.
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