Presidency to Jonathan: You left mismanaged, corrupt economy

The Presidency, on Monday took a swipe at former President Goodluck Jonathan’s claims on governance, describing his administration as the worst in the history of the country.

The presidency further reminded Jonathan that what he handed to President Muhammadu Buhari was an economy ravaged by years of mismanagement and corruption in 2015.

Jonathan had on Saturday during the PDP convention in Abuja said that he handed to Buhari a robustly healthy economy.

But the Presidency in a statement by the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Mallam Garba Shehu said that Jonathan’s government presided over the most monumental and tragic economic mismanagement recorded in the history of the country.

According to the Presidency, the oil sector boomed under Jonathan’s tenure, with oil prices as high as US$120 and peace Presidency to Jonathan: You left mismanaged, corrupt economy in the Niger Delta and Nigeria earned unprecedented dollar revenues. Shehu said, “There is nothing to show for the revenues earned, no major capital project was completed, neither power generation, road development, rail or agriculture benefitted from the windfall earnings.

Rather, the administration presided over the diversion of oil revenues on a such a massive scale, that even without the protection now accorded to Whistleblowers, the then Central Bank Governor blew not only a whistle but a trumpet.

He also explained that “one of Jonathon’s specific boasts is that dollar under him was N180 compared to today.

With such a line of argument it is clear why we are where we are. With oil prices as high as $120 the average inflow of dollars each month was high, making it easy to support cheap dollars.

“However with oil price plummeting as low as $28, the fundamental laws of supply and demand dictated that the currency would need to adjust, since oil was the sole export.

It is instructive to note that virtually every major oil exporter has witnessed currency adjustments with the fall in oil price.

“The Buhari administration has taken a long term strategic view of supporting a stable naira on both the supply and demand sides. President Buhari has driven Import substitution to reduce demand for dollars to buy things we can produce thereby creating thousands of rural jobs in rice and other staples.

In addition, there is a credible plan to diversity our revenue sources away from oil, with focus on export crops as well as solid minerals, with the release of US$100M fund to develop solid mineral extraction.

The presidential spokesman also stated that, “President Buhari has a positive and prosperous vision for Nigeria.

A nation in which the natural talent and hard work of the people is being supported by an enabling environment of infrastructural development and policy reforms that will develop a firm future for our nation.

Nigerians are looking forward and the PDP’s lurking in the economic rear view mirror only underscores the resolve of Nigerians, that as far as the economy is concerned it is ‘‘never again.” “He was hurriedly shown the door.

Meanwhile, the acquisition by public officers and their cohorts of private jets, luxury yachts and the accumulation of expensive property portfolios worldwide continued unabated.

Indeed the President once celebrated having the largest number of private jets, whilst our youth languished without jobs, our fields stood idle and our factories began the layoff of workers. “Government simply reticulated oil revenue through personal spending by corrupt leaders, wasteful expenses and salaries.

This was done rather than investing in what would grow the economy. Economies grow due to capital investment in assets like seaports, airports, power plants, railways, roads and housing.

Nigeria cannot record a single major infrastructural project in the last 10 years. In short the money was mismanaged.

Mathew Dadiya