New naira: Take responsibility for policy failure, Atiku tells APC

The Peoples Democratic Party presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, on Thursday, took a swipe at the ruling All Progressives Congress over the naira redesign policy, asking the party to take responsibility for its failure and hardship it brought upon the masses.

He said the policy failings have led to upheavals in different parts of the country in which lives were lost and properties destroyed.

The PUNCH reports that the growing anger over the cash crisis resulting from CBN currency redesign policy boiled over on Wednesday as protesting customers torched banks and destroyed ATM in Edo and Delta states.

The violence, which paralysed social and economic activities in the two states, also claimed three lives while many others were injured during the riot.

The protests equally spread to Oyo, Ondo, Benue and Kwara states as residents vented their anger over the scarcity of cash which had made life unbearable for many Nigerians.

But Atiku, in a statement titled ‘APC should take responsibility for the failings of its own policy’ which he personally signed on Thursday, said it was surprising that the ruling party is trying to apportion blame to others rather than itself over the crisis.

He said, “This crisis may be coming on the heels of the currency swap, but it is pertinent to remind us that it is a culmination of the frustrations of Nigerians arising from the maladministration of the ruling All Progressives Congress in the past 7 years plus.

“It is easy for political expediency for the APC that has brought us to this cul de sac to want to hoodwink Nigerians into believing that the crisis was created by others.

“Truth be told, the crisis that we are witnessing today was conceived, given birth to and nurtured by the ruling APC. Indeed, it was long in coming.

“We are all witnesses to the myriad of problems that Nigerians have had to endure as a result of the cluelessness of the APC, which came into government with no idea of a policy direction.

“We are witnesses to the massive erosion of jobs; hunger and multidimensional poverty; unabated fuel scarcity; deteriorating security that has created an industry of kidnapping and massacre of defenceless citizens; free fall of the Naira; ASUU strike which kept students at home for prolonged periods of time and a general sense of hopelessness.

“The current crisis, a fallout of the policy of the ruling party’s redesign of the naira, is only the tipping point. The least the ruling APC can do is to take responsibility for its own policy and the challenges that have followed its implementation, even as we collectively work at addressing those challenges.”