President Bola Tinubu has slammed his one-time ally, former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, as offering harebrained solutions to the country’s economic logjam, accusing him of contributing to the woes millions of Nigerians face.

The presidency said the former vice-president’s idea of “consulting upon entering office” stemmed from his ignorance of the state of the economy when Mr Tinubu assumed power.

“The economy was in dire need of urgent action; Tinubu had to quickly adopt a firm action,” presidential spokesman Bayo Onanuga said in a statement.

The statement added, “We can only speculate what detrimental impact Atiku’s proposed lengthy town hall and Village Square meetings would have had on Nigeria’s economy if he had been elected president and taken such an approach.

“The country needed a proactive leader such as Tinubu, who immediately set to work to address economic challenges rather than one who would have squandered precious time on consultations and a questionable privatisation agenda.”

The presidency described Mr Atiku’s excoriation of the president as “harebrained propositions devoid of realistic alternatives,” pointing out that the ex-vice-president must reckon with “the decades of mismanaged economy” inherited by the current administration, including exorbitant subsidy expenditures far exceeding government earnings from crude oil.

“We expect Atiku to commend what the Tinubu administration has done concerning revenue generation for the Federation,” stressed the statement.

He said Atiku’s proposal to privatise the four government-owned refineries, which collectively could only meet a fraction of the nation’s daily fuel consumption when activated, lacked originality.

“The Tinubu administration focuses on revitalising these refineries while supporting modular refineries and the Dangote Refinery, which has greater capacity.

“This approach will guarantee domestic production and stabilise retail prices by reducing foreign exchange challenges. It includes selling crude oil to the refineries in naira, enabling potential cost reductions that could reflect in retail prices,” said the statement.

The presidency alleged that as vice-president, Mr Atiku oversaw the sale of the nation’s assets to private individuals and cronies at low prices and that most public enterprises Mr Atiku sold had been stripped and had become dead assets.

The presidency urged Mr Atiku to stop “pushing for unrealistic timelines” but should “recognise the necessity of President Tinubu’s bold reforms.”

“Let me emphasise that the citizens who cast their votes in the 2023 presidential election are well aware that I did not lose,” Mr Atiku stated on Tuesday. “Rather, we find ourselves in this predicament because the election was criminally stolen from the Nigerian people,” Mr Abubakar stated.

The politician criticised Mr Tinubu’s government for lacking concrete governance plans, claiming that “Tinubu’s government is anchored to a mere Tea-plan, which can only lead to a T-pain.”

Mr Atiku added, “Like many fellow Nigerians, I firmly believe that we find ourselves in this current economic turmoil due to the Tinubu administration’s hasty ascent to power, devoid of a coherent plan.”

Mr Abubakar’s remarks mark the latest exchange between his camp and Mr Tinubu’s over the country’s worsening economy and attendant hardship.

(NAN)