Buhari Group Slams Jonathan, Says N21.27bn Re-election Fund Should Be Spent On Electricity

The Buhari 2015 Support Group Centre on Sunday condemned the N21.27bn donated to President Goodluck Jonathan by businessmen, multinationals and the Peoples Democratic Party governors during a fund raising dinner for the president’s re-election in 2015.

The oil and gas sector donated N5bn; road and construction, N560m; power, N500m, Chairman of Skye Bank, Chief Tunde Ayeni, who chaired the fund raising dinner, donated N2bn on behalf of himself and his associates; former Minister of Information and chairman of the fund raising committee, Prof. Jerry Gana and his friends doled out N5bn while Hajiya Bola Shagaya and her friends too donated N5bn at the televised event, which took place at the Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa, Abuja on Saturday.

However, in a statement on Sunday by its Director of Publicity, Dr. Chidia Maduekwe, the group advised the Jonathan administration to channel the money into the nation’s electricity sector.

The group argued that it was disgraceful for the president and his party to still be talking about improving the nation’s power sector after spending over $20bn.

It said, “Nigerians are worse off in terms of electricity supply than they were 15 years ago”. It added that no nation had ever moved from developing to being developed by relying on generators to power its economy.

The BSGC stressed that the situation was most frightening when one juxtaposes the United Nations population projection of Nigeria by year 2030 at about 253 million and 400 million by 2050.

“The PDP-led government will only lead Nigeria into a demographic disaster with its current failed energy policy”, the group said.

It explained that Buhari and indeed, other Nigerians were right to ask “why we are still in this epileptic electricity mess after spending well over $20bn on the power sector?”

The group said Nigerians should be ashamed that when compared to South Africa’s 40, 000MW for a population of just 50 million, their country was still struggling to generate 4,000 MW.

It also pointed out that on per capita consumption basis, Nigeria is ranked at 178th with consumption of 106.21KWh per person, a figure it noted is well behind Gabon’s 283.6KWh; Cameroun’s 176.0KWh and Kenya’s 128.68KWh.

The BSGC added, “The power sector featured proudly two days ago in contributing towards Mr. President   Jonathan’s re-election campaign fund.

“We would have thought such funds should have been better deployed in giving Nigerians better power supply.

“When four years ago Dr. Goodluck Jonathan said he would not run in 2015, he had then promised that ‘if voted into power within the next four years, the issue of power will become a thing of the past. Four years is enough for anyone in power to make significant improvement and if I can’t improve on power within this period it then means I cannot do anything even if I am there for another four years”.

It claimed that “the ordinary Nigerian on the street knows that he or she is not better off today with electricity supply as against four years ago when Jonathan mounted the saddle”.