Former vice president and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, has accused President Bola Tinubu of buying over opposition figures in order to give his government some form of legitimacy after a questionable electoral victory.
Atiku, in a statement by his special assistant on public communications, Phrank Shaibu, said the Bola Tinubu administration had begun appointing critics into government for sinister motives.
The statement added that Tinubu’s constant meetings with some key opposition figures were being done for the purpose of seeking legitimacy and surreptitiously silencing credible critical voices.
Shaibu said the recent appointment of Taiwo Oyedele, a tax expert at PwC, was only a ploy to get him to stop speaking about the government’s failures as he had been doing almost on a daily basis on television, radio and social media.
He added that former president Muhammadu Buhari similarly did this when he was appointing his economic advisory team.
Shaibu added, “It is common knowledge that Mr. Oyedele is the loudest voice as regards tax reforms. Last Saturday, he pointed out some of the wrong tax policies of the APC government. In a bid to silence him, he was appointed chairman of a tax reform committee on Friday, but no other members were announced. Probably, they want him to work alone.
“With this new appointment, Mr Oyedele will no longer be able to speak about the government’s failures. Mr. Oyedele would do well not to allow himself to be rubbished by Tinubu, a man whose only secret to economic boom is using firms linked to him to generate tax for a commission just as he did in Lagos”.
