Afenifere group urges APC to ‘save’ Nigeria

The Afenifere Renewal Group has
urged the newly registered All
Progressives Congress, APC, to ensure
that its programmes rescue Nigeria
from the brink of collapse.
In a statement on Friday, the Yoruba
socio-political group said that the
emergence of a mega party on the
Nigeria’s political turf is not enough to
end the tide of woes buffeting the
nation’s drifting ship.
“The APC should go a step further by
saving the country completely from
present and future trouble by
incorporating comprehensive
principles of federalism in its cardinal
policies,” said the group in the
statement signed by Kunle Famoriyo,
the Publicity Secretary.
The group stated that it welcomes the
excitement that greeted the
emergence of the APC several weeks
ago when the Independent National
Electoral Commission formalised its
registration.
“The public unveiling of APC’s
manifesto recently convinced us that
the party will entrench a purposeful
administration if given the chance by
Nigerian electorates.”
While unveiling its manifesto on
Thursday, the APC, among other
promises, pledged to tackle Nigeria’s
perennial power problem by
generating 40,000 Mega Watts within
eight years.
The Yoruba group said that an APC-
led administration will change Nigeria
for the better not based on the
manifesto alone, but that many of the
party’s leaders have demonstrated an
inextricable connection between them
and their words.
“In all its grandstanding for the past
14 years, never has the PDP been able
to dare to promise half of what APC
boldly declared as its electoral
promises,” Mr. Famoriyo said. “It is
ridiculous how PDP-led
administrations over the years have
made us believe that good
governance needs weigh more than
rocket science. After 14 years, power
generation fluctuates and has never
exceeded 4,000MW.”
The group stated that it endorses all of
APC’s manifestoes except its stance on
federalism. It further noted that the
nation needs a fundamental political
reform that will overhaul the present
bloated governance structure.
“And we believe such fundamental
reform can only come about through
an instrument of a Sovereign National
Conference,” said Mr. Famoriyo.
“Our country is over-governed. In
2013 budget, the presidency alone
has an allocation of N35.7bn while
Office of Secretary to Government of
the Federation got N70.4bn. We have
more than 30 federal ministers, 469
federal legislators, 36 state governors,
774 local government chairmen and
thousands of state legislators and
councillors, All these political office
holders have retinue of special
assistants, advisers, and consultants.
The present cost of governance is
unsustainable and in fact, anti-
democratic. We must be moving
towards lean governments, which is
why we believe local governments
should not be a federating tier of
government.”
“We also believe that many of our 36
states are weak and nonviable.
Therefore political reform is needed to
allow for willing federating states to
merge in a way that will allow for fiscal
federalism. The leaner the
government, the more transparent it
becomes, and the less we would have
to fund anti-corruption initiatives.”