The African Action Congress (AAC) has blasted Chief Bola Tinubu’s endorsement of the Steve Oronsaye Report, aimed at streamlining governance expenses.
While acknowledging the necessity of addressing task duplication among parastatals, the party condemned Tinubu’s administration for what it deemed a deceptive move.
In a recent statement, the AAC pointed out President Tinubu’s substantial subsidization of the Pilgrimage Commission with billions of naira, questioning the rationale behind such expenditure in a secular state.
The party emphasized the contradiction between advocating for reduced governance costs while simultaneously funding religious trips, expressing bewilderment at the government’s priorities.
In the statement signed by the AAC National Publicity Secretary, Femi Adeyeye, the party queried, “How do you say you want to reduce cost of governance yet fund unproductive parastatals and your government has apparently created Office of the First Lady and that of the first Son?”
“That’s a joke,” the party maintained.
In response to a query posed by Vanguard Newspaper regarding whether state governments should emulate the federal government’s current endeavor to curtail governance expenses by adopting the Oronsaye report, the party articulated several concerns.
The AAC spokesman said, “I think the first port of call is to look at the report itself.
“The Oronsaye report in itself is a bit outdated, needs a lot of constitutional bureaucracy to come to life and it’s somehow deficient in the area of reducing “cost of governance.”
He added that “any ideological person will know that it’s just a means to reduce how much money is spent to cater for civil servants in MDAs.”
The party noted that the report is deficient, noting that it has not addressed “why a President will appoint 52 Ministers (highest since 1999) and many SAs to SSAs. How do you claim you are reducing or merging agencies but you increase Ministries? That’s plus 2, minus 2, which is equal to zero.
“The ultimate goal should be to reduce the cost of running the lifestyle of those in government. You can merge EFCC and ICPC. Good. But then scrap the office of the First Lady and first son. Merge Senate and House of Reps where billions are shared on a monthly basis, or better still keep one, scrap one. That’s our manifesto at the African Action Congress (AAC).”
According to the party, “the resources of Nigerians should not be used to service a bicameral legislative system.
“Many also do not know that the report recommends a wicked cut down on spending on social services, especially education and that’s what the Tinubu regime is targeting. The regime knows what and what it wants to implement in the report. Nigerians can’t be fooled.
“Until this is addressed, the State following what you call example of the Federal Government is defective. And with our history of poor policy and implementation, the states will just end up laying off innocent workers.”
(SaharaReporters)
