Dr Salihu Lukman, Director-General Progressive Governors Forum (PGF) says the current All Progressives Congress (APC) led Federal Government is not a failure, contrary to believe in some quarters.
Lukman said this in a statement on Tuesday in Abuja, adding that allegation that the government was a failure was without substantiation.
He charged Nigerians and opposition political parties to advise the government on ways to address the country’s challenges rather than criticising without basis.
“If APC and its governments are being alleged to be a failure, what is the specific alternative being presented by the opposition to APC.
“The narrative of failure of APC and its governments must be corrected based on a strong mobilisation programme.
“Nigerians just need to focus on finding solutions and less on wailing or blaming, they must be protected from self-styled saviours,’’ he said.
The PGF DG added that both politicians and other desperate individuals,whose mission could only be self-serving, must be objective in their criticisms.
He said that beyond civil society organisations and labour movements, the sad reality was also that the quality of scholarship in academic institutions was to say the least, below standards.
According to him, we have professors, researchers and lecturers who cannot engage in any useful enquiry about the challenges facing the country.
“Many so-called professors, researchers and lecturers, rather than working to provide new insights about challenges facing the country and to that extent propose alternative responses, join the complaining and wailing’ community.
“They speak in languages that are offensive to government and political leaders with unsubstantiated allegations, ‘’ Lukman said.
He said that part of what had been lost was the fact that categories of leaders of Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) who used to have strong values that envisioned a prosperous country had disappeared.
He said it was sad that the current leadership of the NGOs were individuals who saw nothing good in Nigeria and its political leadership.
He said such leaders promoted campaign for hatred against the country and its leadership while the culture of political intimidation, using protests and strikes had become rampant.
He stressed that to be different, APC members should be able to appeal to the party’s leaders to urgently develop a strong mobilisation campaign that could connect citizens with government’s initiatives.
He advised that as part of such mobilisation campaign, raising public awareness about initiatives’ government was taking should be a priority.
“The second thing is also to be able to provide feedback to government about the effectiveness of initiatives taken by APC governments,’’ he said.
He added that citizens should also be made to know their expected roles in their different fields of endeavours to achieve envisioned realities.
He added that APC members needed to take responsibility by acknowledging that challenges facing the country required a strong mobilisation campaign as a fundamental requirement for bringing about change in Nigeria.(NAN)
