…. Says Failure to Market Nigeria’s Crude Is Economic Sabotage
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) mocks President Muhammadu Buhari’s
performance at the meeting with US President Donald Trump as
embarrassing as he completely failed to project the economic interests
of our nation before the American government and the world.
It was alarming that President Buhari buckled in bilateral negotiation
and failed to address the issue of the drop in the US purchase of our
crude oil, which is the main stay of our economy.
Nigerians and the business community were aghast when President Buhari
could not market our crude oil to his American counterpart even when in
the course of question and answer session, a leeway was provided for
him, he off-handedly declared that he cannot “tell America what to do”.
Also President Buhari had no answers to President Trump’s stance that
the US has not been investing substantially in Nigeria owing to
unconducive economic climate under his administration, further
confirming the stand of the PDP that the All Progressives Congress (APC)
is running a moribund economy
More disturbing is the revelation by President Trump that the US has
been supporting Nigeria with the sum of $1bn annually whereas President
Buhari, in his script, announced that Nigeria received only $500m last
year.
We had expected President Buhari, as the ‘African Champion on
Anti-Corruption’, to immediately respond to President Trump on the
whereabouts of the shortfall of $500m.
It is also inexcusable that President Buhari had no answers to the
security situation of daily bloodletting and mass killings in Nigeria,
which President Trump described as “horrible”. Instead, he restricted
himself to his script, which was silent on the issue. By this, the
American government has summarily indicted President Buhari’s government
on its failure to ensure security of lives and property of citizens.
On the whole, the visit surmises photo-ops of President Buhari in the
White House in a bilateral session where President Trump was committed
to marketing the US to the most populous black nation.
