Femi Adesina: Only ‘Deliberately Blind, Willfully Deaf’ Nigerians Score Buhari Low On Performance

Presidential aide, Femi Adesina, has said some Nigerians deliberately feign ignorance of President Muhammadu Buhari’s accomplishments in office for various reasons.

Adesina said some have failed to see Buhari’s achievements out of deliberate ignorance, panic, or malice.

He described such people as “deliberately blind” and “willfully deaf”. He said some Nigerians have made up their minds never to see anything good in whatever the president does.

Adesina stated these in an opinion article titled “facts are stubborn things” where he highlighted some achievements of Buhari as his administration clocks five years next week.

He said, “The President and his team are steadily and painstakingly retooling Nigeria. Out of sheer and deliberate ignorance, some people deride it, saying we see nothing, we hear nothing. Yes. When you have become deliberately blind, you can see nothing, even when it is thrust before your very eyes. You won’t see it. When you have become willfully deaf, when it is noised to your hearing daily, you won’t hear.

“Some other people do theirs out of panic. Shall it be said that what Napoleon couldn’t do, has been done by that simple, unassuming man from Daura? Can anything good come out of Nazareth? Daura of all places. That small place. Not a man from a major city. And he wants to be recorded in history as the man who turned Nigeria right side up. They resent it out of panic.

“Yet some others operate out of malice. He is not of my ethnic stock. Nor of my religion, language, political party. Why must Nigeria work under him? It won’t happen. We won’t see anything, nor hear anything. In fact, he is doing nothing. The country is even worse off than he met it five years ago,” said the presidential aide.

Adesina identified some of the key achievements of President Buhari in the last five years to include the ongoing Second Niger Bridge, rail construction, and social investment interventions, among others.

He said, “Some people pass on the 1965 Niger Bridge, see the new one in the works, and just pretend not to. Some others see it, and they are angry. Will this Daura man succeed where others have failed? But facts are stubborn things. “Truth is incontrovertible. Ignorance may deride it, panic may resent it, malice may destroy it, but there it is.””

The presidential aide said despite the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic and global crash in oil prices, ongoing projects of the present administration include the Owerri Interchange, the restarting of 53 infrastructure projects in 26 states, and the commencement of 92 repair works across 24 states.

Adesina said, “Nigeria will be one huge construction site, at a time the economy is down, and revenue has shrunk considerably. That is the hallmark of a government out to serve the people, come rain or shine,” adding that President Buhari’s investment in Agriculture in 2015 would help the country attain food self-sufficiency.