The Special Adviser to the President on Political Matters, Senator Babafemi Ojudu, has criticised the trend on the social media of comparing President Muhammadu Buhari and acting President Yemi Osinbajo.
Ojudu said that without the President, there could not be the Vice or acting President.
“I think it is thoughtless. I also see it as a ploy by the opposition to cause unnecessary division. It is a joint ticket. The President and the Vice President were elected based on the manifesto of the party,” he told the State House Press Corps,
“Since they were sworn in they have been committed to implementing that manifesto.
“The same people who are saying that now are the ones who are saying that we never had an economic team; we have no policy, that we have nothing.
“It is now that the policies that we are implementing are maturing that they are seeing the result.
“It is not a question of one person doing better than the other person.
“There is nothing that has been done in this administration or since the Vice President started acting that is not something that started far back in the past.
“A good example is the Niger Delta initiative.
“The President called the Vice President and gave him the mandate to go to the Niger Delta and meet with everyone who is a stakeholder there, the communities where oil is produced, all the leaders of the place, talk to militants and make sure to resolve this problem to the benefit of Nigerians.
“We are losing 1.2 million barrels of oil per day, all the gas pipelines powering the turbines are being blown up and the President said that unless and until we solve this problem we will not come out of recession.
“The VP took up the mandate and went to the Niger Delta.”
According to Ojudu, the Niger Delta dialogue is the initiative of the President, not that of the Vice President.
He said it was mischief makers who did not wish the country well that are promoting that kind of divisive ideas.
The presidential aide said that the Acting President was consulting the President almost daily in running the country.
According to him, there are things that the Vice President needs to consult the President, especially on major decisions because he is acting.
He noted that “the Acting President is in charge at present but the President is still the President no matter what’’.
He said it was incumbent on the Acting President to call on the President where there were major issues to be decided on to get his opinion.
He said the consultation did not also mean that the Acting President was not independent, adding that Osinbajo would ensure that the country was well administered.
“Again one other thing you have to see is that if you give someone a responsibility, he must also be able to show to the President that the fact of his not being around he is not going to create any vacuum.
“Even, he can then decide not to have a sleep at all through the time that the President may be away just to let him know that he is capable of ensuring that Nigeria goes on well while he is away.
“And the President could also have given a mandate, ‘let nothing go wrong, I believe in you, I appointed you as my Vice President, you must make sure that you do this.
“If you have somebody who is your boss and gives you an assignment, you want to impress him and you want to impress Nigerians as well.
“That for me is what has happened, not in the sense that one person is better than the other, certainly not.”
On the alleged propagation that the President was poisoned which appeared in the social media, the aide described the report as untrue.
He advised the media men to be careful about the information they got from the social media as there was a fake factory for fake news in Nigeria.
He said the publication about some imaginary money kept somewhere by the President which the alleged poison maker wanted to inherit was untrue.
He noted that Nigeria had a President whom no one could question his integrity in all his public and private lives adding that none could succeed in tarnishing his image.
