UPP Backs Buhari On Executive Order
9th July, 2018
Press Release
The United Progressive Party (UPP) Commends Absolutely The Executive Order No. 6 By President Muhammadu Buhari
Our great party, the United Progressive Party and its leadership are
in total solidarity with President Muhammadu Buhari for issuing the
Executive Order No. 6, which is on the seizure of assets that are
under investigation including those assets whose owners or claimants
to their title are not able to satisfactorily prove their sources of
legitimate acquisition.
We wish to recall that on Tuesday 5th May, 2015, a cross-section of
the National Executive Committee (NEC) of our party paid a courtesy
call to then President- elect, a couple weeks before his formal
inauguration, which took place on 29th May 2015, at the Eagle Square,
Abuja. In congratulating Mr. President for his resounding victory at
the presidential election, we recommended to him three areas he should
give priority attention in his administration. We recommended that he
should declare state of emergency in the power sector. We also
recommended that he should pursue the introduction of Electronic
Voting System (EVS). The third recommendation we made was
anti-corruption drive and we proposed as follows:
“We are aware like most discerning Nigerians that you are fully
prepared to square up to the challenges ahead, but permit us to
suggest that your
Government should among other things spare no effort to recover all
recoverable of our common patrimony in private hands whether in
Nigeria or abroad, which has been illegally or illegitimately
acquired. UPP shall join the vanguard to mobilize public support for
you in this effort. In making this suggestion, we are convinced that
recovering as little as twenty-five percent of our common wealth in
private hands will go a long way in assisting you fulfill most of your
campaign promises to the Nigerian people, to the glory of God”
We have followed with admiration the single-mindedness of the Buhari
administration to fight corruption and recover looted funds from our
common treasury. In fighting corruption, the present APC-led
government has been implementing the policies of the Treasury Single
Account (TSA) and the Bank Verification Number (BVN), in such a
comprehensive manner that unprecedented huge amount of funds have been
recovered while various leakages that existed in the 16 years before
the advent of the Buhari administration have been largely plugged.
The whistle blowing policy is another unprecedented innovation in fighting
corruption that has put the fear of God in many public officers and
their criminal accomplices at home and aboard. We believe that with
improved efficiency in the implementation of these policies the fight
against corruption will be won to a very large extent within the
period of the tenure of the Buhari administration.
The greatest challenge we perceive that is confronting the government
is the tortuous and sometimes frustrating legal processes in securing
the conviction of those who have been identified to have looted the
national treasury of this country for several years and used some of
these illegal and fraudulent acquisitions to invest in properties and
stock in Nigeria and abroad with a large chunk of the loot stashed
away in foreign banks where the countries the funds are domiciled are
using them to develop their economies.
It is in this regard that we are in absolute solidarity with President
Buhari for issuing the Executive Order No. 6. We are not impressed by
the reaction of those who claim that the Executive Order is for the
purpose of witch-hunting. There is no Nigerian who has acquired his
wealth legitimately that should be afraid of being caught up by the
Executive Order. Only those who have access to our national treasury
and abused such privileges and positions should be afraid of the well
intended Executive Order No. 6. The United Progressive Party has no
iota of sympathy for such people. Those who argue that the Executive
Order No. 6 is unconstitutional are at liberty to approach the courts
to seek redress and stop unnecessary noisy politicking.
CHIEF DR CHEKWAS OKORIE
NATIONAL CHAIHMAN, UPP
