Presidency Fires Back At PDP Over Criticism Of Ex-Military Chiefs

Garba Shehu

The ex-Service Chiefs are awaiting confirmation by the Senate as non-career ambassadors

The Presidency on Saturday said the Peoples Democratic Party was grasping at straws over its criticism of President Muhammadu Buhari’s appointment of the ex-Service Chiefs as ambassadors.

The President had, on January 4, forwarded the names of the service chiefs – who resigned on January 26 – as nominees to the Senate as non-career ambassadors-designate.

But the PDP, in a statement, had said it was a decoy to shield the immediate past service chiefs “from investigation over alleged killing of innocent Nigerians and crimes against humanity under their inglorious watch.”

In a statement released on Saturday, Presidential spokesman Garba Shehu said such an appointment was “normal in decent democratic societies.”

“What is baffling about this false and baseless assertion is that this is coming, not from Boko Haram terrorists who the military kept largely in check and confined to a known section of the country, Sambisa, but from a so-called leading opposition party that fraudulently kept power for 16 years and is nursing the hope of one day returning to office as an elected government,” the statement partly read.

Continuing, the presidency also said: “We live in an evidence-based era for arguments. If the PDP has evidence of rights abuse against the military in the war against terrorists, wouldn’t it be beneficial to the nation that they publish such evidence instead of levying grave accusations without proves? And to ask, in whose interest are they making these accusations that lack any depth?

“To add, we don’t think the ICC, which these childish calls are being made needs to be lectured on democratic values and human rights by the PDP. Who are they, and what is their record in office to lecture anyone? Zaki Biam and Odi where thousands of citizens were on record, the genocide operation comes to mind. Did they report themselves to the ICC?

“PDP’s attacks on the ambassadorial nominations should be seen in the context of the opposition party’s track record as a university of liars, whose modus operandi is to propagate lies.”

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