PDP Calls for Fashola’s Resignation over Comments on Nigerian Roads
POLITICS DIGEST – Nigeria’s main opposition party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has called for the resignation of the Minister of Works and Housing, Babatunde Fashola, over his comments on the condition of Nigerian roads.
Fashola was reported to have been saying the bad state of Nigerian roads was “exaggerated.”
“The roads (in the country) are not as bad as they are often portrayed. I know that this is going to be your headline, but the roads are not that bad,” he told journalists after the FEC meeting in Abuja on Wednesday.
PDP, in its reaction signed by its spokesperson, Kola Ologbodinyan, on Friday, described the statement as unfortunate.
The party demanded the resignation of the minister and asked him to “apologise to Nigerians over his unpardonable comment.”
A member of the House of Representatives and House Committee on works, Bamidele Salam, had earlier challenged the Minister to a 90-day road tour of the country to see how deplorable the roads have become.
So far, Mr Fashola has not “taken up the challenge” either has APC reacted to the statement.
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Meanwhile, the party asked the APC to stop dwelling on its (PDP)16 years of rule and deliver it promises to Nigerians. The APC constantly accuses the opposition party of not ruling the nation well while it held sway between 1999 and 2015.
The party says the statement “is a violent assault on the sensibility of over 200 million Nigerians and further demonstrates the disdain with which the Buhari administration holds our citizens who lost their lives and many more who daily undergo mental and physical torture using our dilapidated roads”.
“The @OfficialPDPNig holds that the minister’s comment must be premeditated and reflects the official position of the @MBuhari-led @OfficialAPCNg administration, which has no regard for Nigerians and only thrives in propaganda and false claims to cover its failures in governance.
“Every Nigerian knows that most of the major roads across the country are in sorry state and that travelling on our roads has become traumatizing and one of the highest life threatening experiences in our country since the last four years.
“The PDP invites Nigerians to note that such leadership failures characterized by reckless statements is always characteristic of governments that did not derive from the mandate of the people at the polls and therefore believe that it is not answerable to them,” Mr Ologbodinyan said.
