Former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Mahmud Yayale Ahmed has urged President-elect, General Muhammadu Buhari to prevent the members of cabinet in Jonathan’s government from leaving Nigeria after May 29 hand over of government.Yayale said many of the government officials may have cases to answer on several omissions that the hand over note to Buhari may contain and hence should be around to offer answers, if necessary.
Vice President Namadi Sambo had alluded to issues of queries, which the hand over notes may generate, and had assured the Ahmed Joda led Transition Committee Chairman appointed by General Buhari that he and others will be around for explanations.
Yayale, the pro-chancellor and chairman of council of the Bayero University, Kano (BUK) gave the advice after presenting a paper at the 31st convocation lecture of the university on Monday
He said by the time Buhari takes off in government, there will be need for his government to get clarifications on a number of issues left behind by the government of President Goodluck Jonathan and hence, may require explanations.
He made specific allusion to this while presenting his paper titled; “The 2015 Transition: Realities, Expectations and the Challenges”.
Said he, “I want to inform you that whether there is proper briefing or not, the reality will become reality on May 29.
“After Buhari has taken over, the government will see where to ask questions and in what we call public accountability, nobody should be allowed to go without accounting for what is not there.”
Yayale said Nigerians should not expect miracles from Buhari, but should rather support him with prayers.
According to him, there have been a lot of rots on the ground in Nigeria, which he reasoned will make miracle a difficult thing to happen.
While calling for concerted efforts by Nigerians to solve the crises in Nigeria, the former bureaucrats said the major problem with the Nigerian economy is not about the country’s size, but the people and their ways.
“The country is increasingly becoming mired in debts. After painfully exiting the Paris Club and other external debts, with a cash payment of over $12 billion, the foreign debts are piling up again from $4.5 billion in 2010 to $6.4 billion in 2014.
“The domestic debt profile increased from $30.5 billion in 2010 to $47 billion in 2014. On the whole public debt has grown by $18 billion between 2010 and 2014.
A major problem of this debt profile is that most of the debt is incurred on consumption (recurrent) and not investment (capital)”.