BY KENNETH EZE
The ruling All Progressives Congress is steadily tightening the noose on the citizenry with harsh economic policies and dictatorial tendencies, thereby fueling poverty, inflation and hardship with resultant high rate of criminality across the land.
Principal Partner Ubani & Co, Monday Ubani, expressed the view in a telephone chat with The Point.
He lamented that dictatorial tendencies and punitive economic policies have come to characterise the present federal government, though it was largely expected to be a model of democracy, having gotten to power on the back of the promise of ‘change’.
Ubani decried that the essential element of democracy, which he described as citizen-participation in governance, has been taken away by the present APC government.
On the recent increment of drivers’ licensing and vehicle registration fees, he expressed concern on the decision making process, announcement and the policy.
He said, “The present government does not carry anyone along on anything.”
Ubani asserted that the government would not stop at increasing drivers’ and vehicles’ licensing fees.
“There’s nothing this government would not touch, in terms of price increment. And there are no jobs,” he added.
He wondered why government should embark on incessant price increases, knowing that the direct consequences would be lower standard of living for the populace.
Ubani also feared that the Nigerian people might not hold on for much longer, under the present circumstances.
“These anti-people policies of the APC government would definitely affect people’s behaviour and make them more defiant. The multiplier effect is that the people can no longer afford three-square meals a day.
This has led to so much hunger, with attendant increase in criminality, there will be agitation and frustration across the country,” he observed.
He urged Nigerians to wake up from their slumber and stand up for their rights, saying “It’s up to the people themselves to wake up from their slumber and know that this is not what we voted for.”
He called on the government to reconsider its policies, to factor in the component of rights and obligations to save itself from the anger of the masses.
“The multiplier effect is that the people can no longer afford three-square meals a day. This has led to so much hunger, with attendant increase in criminality, there will be agitation and frustration across the country
“
“There are basic things that the government owe the people as responsibilities and if they are not fulfilled, the people have a right to react,” he pointed out.
He cautioned that collective silence would leave everyone stifled while things might drift from bad to worse.
“If we keep quiet everyone would be stifled. But if we wake up and say ‘no’, the government will feel the pulse of the people and probably change from this stifling style of governance, going on,” Ubani added.
He lamented that “You are not enjoying the economy. You are not enjoying political independence, your rights are being violated, the government is not obeying court orders.”
He said that he was struggling to find something to commend the APC government for, without success, saying “If the economy is buoyant and the civic space is being stifled, you can take solace in that, but there doesn’t seem to be any breather anywhere.”
On the silence from the constituency of civil society and human rights campaigners, he fingered two factors weighing against civil agitation in Nigeria.
He cited the dictatorial tendencies of the government and the slack support from the citizenry to rights agitators as the silencers in the mouths of various civil society groups and personalities.
“The government has resorted to use of force to silence those who speak up against ill-governance in Nigeria. The level of support from the citizenry, which has also not been very encouraging have telling effects on the civil society constituency,” he lamented.
However, he warned that the use of law enforcement agencies to stifle the civil society would soon expire, because all that civil rights campaigners require was some level of assurance that the people would stand up for them, if they were picked up.
He sounded convinced that if the people sat up, the government would wake up.
