Kwara Speaker, Ali Ahmad

The Speaker of the Kwara House of Assembly, Dr Ali Ahmad, on Tuesday told journalists that the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari has failed, citing as example, the reaction of the presidency to the recent robbery incident in Offa part of the state and the prosecution of anti-corruption war.

Ahmad, a member of All Progressives Congress, a close ally of the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, said, “That one (inaction) is reflected in Offa when the incident happened. We were all saddened and grieving, looking for fatherly words to placate our grief. Those words never came until three days after.

“The Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki, even cut short his journey to come; but the Federal Government that is in control of security apparatus, which lost policemen, if civilians are not worth anything to them, did not act on time.

“I will score the APC or whoever that is at the Federal Government very low. I am in Kwara and if this thing happened and the person that is in control of security did not do anything until 72 hours later, it is an after-thought. I am disappointed. And if you ask me to go with whoever that is, I will think twice.”

“The best person that Nigeria has ever had to fight corruption since independence is Buhari but he bungled it. He did! And I cannot see him correcting this.

“I delivered a lecture at the Nigeria Union of Journalists event in Ibadan when this government was less than six months. I told them, you cannot fight corruption in Nigeria the way the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission or the Federal Government was fighting it. From day one, you know that our court system is slow; the Administration of Criminal Justice has reduced it by 40 or 50 per cent but it is still slow.

“You have only four years, how can you place your number one priority on a platform that you know is beyond your control, the judiciary? You cannot fight corruption with the judiciary alone, you cannot.”

“We have told him (Buhari) that he should strengthen the state and federal lawmakers. Get the buy-in of Nigerians, which is zero at the moment. Nobody believes you are fighting corruption; when you place that priority on the door of the judiciary and after three years, you tell me that the judiciary is the stumbling block; we warned you that you cannot fight corruption in four years through the judiciary, you cannot.”

He also condemned the release of a looters list by the Federal Government: “Whoever is preparing that list is taking Nigerians for a ride. If you tell them that it (the list) is one-sided, they will mention some APC members that are on the list but if you look critically, you will see that those APC members are those that are not in agreement with them. So, it does not still answer the question that you are putting only the opposition in the list.”