The National Union of Textile Garment and Tailoring Workers of Nigeria on Sunday in Kaduna urged the Minister of Information and Communication, Prof. Dora Akunyili to honourably resign from the Federal Executive Council.
The NUTGTWN argued that Akunyili’s recent controversial memo to the FEC on the need for ailing President Umaru Yar’adua to hand over power to Vice President Goodluck Jonathan was belated and an afterthought.
But the Niger State Governor, Dr. Mu’azu Aliyu Babangida on Sunday cautioned those condemning Akunyili, saying her asking Yar’Adua to transmit power would save the country from further embarrassment.
Yar’Adua has been receiving treatment for acute pericardiatis in a Saudi Arabian hospital in the past two months.
According to the textile workers’ union, the minister’s belated move after many prominent Nigerians have bared their minds on the issue of Yar’Adua’s refusal to hand over to his deputy following his long absence from the country and the Senate’s resolution on the matter, smacks of “cheap grandstanding and sheer political diversion.”
The NUTGWN General Secretary, Issa Aremu at a news conference said that having failed to use her “rebranding project” to compel the members of the Federal cabinet to “obey the rules of delegation and representation in a democracy”, Akunyili should display courage and resign her appointment as a minister.
This, the union said, would be in line with the practice in civilised societies where political appointees who suffered a crisis of confidence with those who appointed them usually resigned honourably.
The NUTGTWN accused the minister of heating up the polity with her memo.
It said, “The information and communication minister should stop insulting the sensibilities of Nigerians and resign honourably from the Federal cabinet. The minister proved unable and incompetent to “rebrand” the Federal cabinet to obey the rules of delegation and representation in a democracy.”
Meanwhile, Governor Aliyu at the end of the year dinner/award night organised by Bankers’ Committee, Minna zone on Sunday argued that, what the minister did had gone a long way to prove to non-Nigerians and other world countries that the country and her citizenry have been subjected to in the past two months.
Aliyu pointed out that, while many Nigerians knows the level of harm the continued absence of President Yar’Adua and failure to act according to the constitutional provision of handing over to the VP or writing to the National Assembly have caused the country, many of them still want to be sycophantic and pretentions about it.
The governor said, “Many Nigerians also shared the views of Akunyili but who will speak out and if she fail to speak out as government mouth piece who then will do it for us. We cannot continue to remain the way we are, we must move on.
“Most of the problems we have today as a country is because we shy away from speaking out on issues of national and regional interest when it mattered most, and by so doing we give room for people who have no business speaking for government and the regions to do so.”
Aliyu further argued that, should Akunyili fail to speak out, many Nigeria will still call her names and have the believe that she is not competent in doing her job, adding that, with her outspokenness, Nigerians and other countries of the world will not see the government as a failure simply because President Umaru Yar’Adua is out on medical grounds and as a result nobody to direct the affairs of the country.
He called on those condemning Akunyili for braving all odds to have a rethink in the interest of the country, stressing that, “Many of the people calling for the head of Akunyili for speaking out are not doing so because they love Nigeria but because like a cabal they have vested interest.”
