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Says presidential spokesmen incompetent
The Catholic Bishop of Sokoto Diocese, Matthew Kukah, yesterday said even First Lady Aisha Muhammadu Buhari had disagreed with her husband on policies.
He lambasted presidential spokesmen, Femi Adesina and Garba Shehu, for engaging him over his criticism of President Muhammadu Buhari’s handling of the security and other national challenges.
Kukah had, in his Easter sermon, alleged that Buhari had destroyed Nigeria.
Adesina and Shehu had attacked fired back at Kukah; with Shehu challenging him to take off his robe and join partisan politics.
But speaking on an ARISE TV programme yesterday, Kukah said he only spoke about Buhari’s inability to manage diversities effectively and efficiently, not about the president’s person or character.
He challenged Adesina and Shehu to a debate on national issues, saying “I don’t know whether any of them has the ability or the capacity to speak about guilt or no guilt”.
“Of course, I’m not unaware of the state of mind of my two friends, Femi Adesina and Garba Shehu, when it comes to talking about Bishop Kukah. They seem to suspend reason and go into overdrive.
“Unless, of course, Garba Shehu has plans to convert to Christianity or he’s a closet Christian or he’s an anonymous Christian, I appreciate the fact that when it comes to talking, he has not quoted the Holy Quran. All he does is end up with some convoluted interpretations of the Bible and embarrassing in their contexts.
“And I’m surprised that Femi Adesina who I believe is a reverend of sort in the Foursquare Gospel Church, I’m surprised that he’s unable to help his friend who they sat together.
“But let me simply say that I’ve made an offer to them and still make the offer that they can choose the venue, choose the time and just let me know. I’d like to sit down with the three of them beginning with their honorable minister and both of them. Let’s sit down together and talk about Nigeria.”
“These are the only spokesmen that have spent a lot of time buying, photocopying paper and simply typing away texts. They’ve been involved in all kinds of writing of the poorest quality, never talking to the issues.
“So, first thing is to show you their inefficiency. It’s that they’re used to writing statements as opposed to taking to Nigerians about policies.
“What this tells you is that 99.99% of what they write are imply second-guessing what the president’s mind is. They’ve no contact with the president, they’ve no contact with government policies and all they’re doing is writing on behalf of the president.
“There’s nowhere in the world where the job of this nature is being done as has been done so poorly.”
