Flamboyant Senator, Otunba Dino Melaye, on Sunday expressed concern over the economic recession in the country, with a call on President Muhammadu Buhari to sack members of his economic team and constitute a new team.

Melaye, chairman, Senate Committee on the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and Founder of Anti-Corruption Network, tabled the demands in a statement entitled “Buhari – The barking is over, it’s time to bite,” obtained by journalists in Abuja.

While expressing worry by the poor state of the economy which has brought unprecedented hardship and hunger on the masses of the Nigerian people, he said sacking the economic team would be the only solution to reboot the ailing economy.

Melaye accused most members of the President’s cabinet of gross incompetence, inexcusable ineptitude and a distressing lack of capacity to deliver on the mandate of their ministries/agencies, adding Buhari must shake up his cabinet.

He said: “At the moment, it must be crystal clear to all discerning minds that the President’s widely-acclaimed magical body language has lost its presumed aura and efficacy. His no-nonsense demeanor is equally neither instilling fear nor commanding respect and loyalty from amongst his cabinet members. It is therefore obvious that the time for barking is over, now is the time to bite and boot out all those who have demonstrated, in the past several months, a crass lack of capacity to effectively carry out the functions of their office.”

He also called on the President to immediately discountenance the Economic Team currently under the supervision of the Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osibanjo, “as their decisions will not be; and has never been respected by the economic managers and the bureaucracy in Nigeria.”

Instead, Melaye urged the President to constitute an “Emergency Ad hoc Economic Team” made up of all former Ministers of Finance, Budget and National Planning, CBN Governors as well as members drawn from the academia with “deep knowledge of developmental economics to drive the economic revival programme.”

“The President must immediately transit from mere rhetoric to drastic but positive action to save the economy and Nigeria from total collapse. The hunger in the land is real, pervasive, widespread and debilitating for the poor masses. As I walk the streets of my constituency these days, I constantly harbor a foreboding that I could be stoned by my angry constituents for the failure of Mr President to fulfill his campaign promises and expectations to Nigerians,” he said.

“Nigeria is tottering on a dangerous precipice, sliding perilously to a certain catastrophe if the current economic malaise is not halted immediately,” he declared, even as he said his criticism is borne out of an altruistic fervour, and not a product of sour grapes akin to some traditional critics of “Every Government in Power (EGIP),” he added.

Nigerians and Buhari, he said, should be able to recall with little difficulty that “I was a permanent fixture at the All Progressive Congress (APC’s) Presidential campaign rallies and events, functioning mostly as the Master of Ceremonies (MC).”

He said: “I am a proud APC member, a party bonafide with a great stake in the success or failure of this administration, so no one can accuse me of sour grapes or meddlesomeness. I am a truly concerned stakeholder presently bothered by the imminent, clear and present danger of a still-birth of a Change Agenda that held so much hope and promise for Nigerians a little over a year ago.

“While there is a lot of hunger, anger, anguish and despair currently in the land, I have a firm belief that the situation is not beyond redemption for Mr President, hence my call for urgent and drastic remedial action now.”

•Photo shows Senator Dino Melaye.

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