A presidential aspirant under the platform of the All Progressive Congress, Comrade Salihu Othman Isah, on Sunday, challenged both current and serving state governors and ministers, aspiring for the presidency to shelve their ambition, following their failure to fulfill their promises to the electorate that gave them the mandate.
In a press statement made available to The PUNCH over the weekend, Isah categorically stated “that instead of aspiring for the presidency, they should rather bury their heads in a gallery of shame, over their poor performance in both their current and previous positions they occupied.
Isah, who is an activist and entertainer, said that it was disgusting that governors of states ravaged by insecurity under their watch were sticking out their necks to vie for various elective positions, expending state resources, especially security votes, which they were supposed to deploy for securing their citizens.
The actor, and former National Vice President of the Actors Guild of Nigeria, further disclosed that in Europe and the United States of America, including some parts of Asia, no leader, who had under-performed was ever encouraged to vie for offices or return to the ones they were currently holding when they had performed woefully.
Also, he bemoaned the situation whereby leaders, who could not pass a mere integrity test if conducted on them were either elected or reelected into office.
“The situation we contend with is that none of the elected governors or appointees can scale through a transparently conducted integrity test. The best we can have is a few of them scoring less than 40% and in this case, 40% out of 100% is not considered a pass mark.”
The APC Presidential aspirant also said that it was equally shameful that some African nations we considered as poor and lowly, describing them as banana republics were, in reality, doing a lot better than Nigeria which dressed on a borrowed robe as the giant of Africa.
According to him, he was shocked and surprised during his visit to some of these countries about 10 years ago, to be overwhelmed with the level of growth, particularly in infrastructure and stability they had attained.
“If given the opportunity, I’ll replicate and surpass the level of development in some of these African countries I visited totally with our status as the Giant of Africa,’’ he said.
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