News

Obasanjo, Buhari more accessible than Tinubu while in office – Ndume

The Chief Whip of the Senate, Ali Ndume, has said former presidents Olusegun Obasanjo and Muhammadu Buhari, were more accessible than Bola Ahmed Tinubu.

Obasanjo became  Nigeria’s first democratically elected president in 1999, and was in charge till 2007. Buhari  also spent eight years in power from 2015 to 2023, and was succeeded by Tinubu who took over office last year.

Speaking in an interview on Arise TV on Friday, Ndume said it is difficult to have an appointment with Tinubu because is being “shielded from reality” by some of his appointees.

The senator representing Borno South at the upper chamber, said Obasanjo “who was older than our president is now, in 24 hours, any senator has access to him, ministers go in and out. That is politics. You talk to the people, hear from the people.”

“If you know the president before now, you would know that the whole scenario has changed”, Ndume said.

“This is somebody, he stays in Lagos… if you go to Bourdillon, any day, any time in the night, you can go to Bourdillon at 2 O’clock in the morning and in most cases you would find President Tinubu receiving people and seeing them off.

“But now, if you go to the front of the villa, it’s like a graveyard because they don’t allow anybody to go and see Mr. President.

“During Buhari’s administration, which I thought was not that good… but if you compare this now to Buhari’s regime, you would give Buhari a thumbs-up. At least Buhari opens up, people come to see him”.

Ndume reiterated that most ministers do not have access to the president.

“There are some ministers who don’t have access to Mr. President. The only access they have to Mr. President is when they are invited. And some may never be invited,” he added.

“Or they can see the president when they go for council meetings. And you know, when they go for council meetings, by the time the president walks in, all of them are seated. And the president is always the first to leave.”

Related Articles

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Back to top button