Garba Shehu, the Senior Special Assistant, Media and Publicity to President Muhammadu Buhari, has said only opposition political parties could say Buhari’s two terms of eight years is a “total failure.”
He made the assertion on Friday evening while speaking on Channels Television’s political programme, Politics Today.
Shehu argued that the administration’s policies were with the best of intentions.
“I don’t know anyone who is saying that [Buhari’s government is a total failure] except for opposition political parties that ran in the last election. I don’t know anyone saying the eight years was a total failure.
“Government policies under President Muhammadu Buhari are driven by the best of intentions, it was never driven by reasons of wickedness or ill-will towards the national population.
“When you talk about the currency exchange, this is an administration that has launched a series of economic reform programmes one of which targeted the massive corruption that we inherited from the PDP,” he said.
He said an assessment of all the off-season elections showed that the use of money to entice voters had been an issue.
“What is wrong in saying ‘can we have Nigerians decide who to lead them away from the influence of money?'” Shehu queried.
He also said the currency exchange policy reduced the spate of criminality in the country, citing kidnapping as an example.
The president’s aide said: “When the currency things were going on, did the kidnappers move against Nigerians? So, there are some benefits.”
Garba also said the high cost of living in the country is not peculiar to Nigeria, adding that it is a global crisis.
He said infrastructure had collapsed while the country imports almost everything before the current government, adding that the Buhari government’s intervention had saved the country from collapsing.
