The All Progressives Congress, APC, has denied claims that President Bola Tinubu promised to eradicate poverty in Nigeria within three years of assuming office.
The party’s National Publicity Secretary and spokesman for the APC Presidential Campaign Council, Felix Morka said the president never gave a specific timeline for eradicating poverty during his campaign.
Morka spoke on Tuesday while fielding questions on Arise Television’s Morning Show programme.
He argued that campaign promises were objectives to be progressively realised rather than outcomes that must be achieved within a specific period.
“You know, the only thing you didn’t say in just what you read out was a calendar of what the president gave you was a timeline for eradicating poverty that even the wealthiest countries have not managed to eradicate in all of their years of post-independent government,” he said.
Morka insisted that Tinubu never promised to eliminate poverty within his first 100 days, two years or three years in office.
“The president never told you that in the first month or 100 days of my government, or in the first two years or three years, I am going to eradicate poverty. You didn’t say that in what you just read out,” he added.
The APC spokesman urged Nigerians to assess the administration’s poverty reduction efforts within the broader context of the country’s economic challenges.
He maintained that the president was working to address the fundamental problems affecting the country, adding that it was unfair to conclude that the administration had failed simply because all its campaign promises had yet to materialise.
“Now, the president is attempting to fix that foundational problem. You come and you want to judge and say all of the outcomes you promise, whether directly or indirectly or by suggestion, have not manifested. Therefore, you are not doing that in three years,” Morka said.
He further argued that the four-year tenure granted to an elected president, with the possibility of re-election for another four years, was designed to allow sufficient time to understand national challenges, establish policies and implement them.
According to him, the first term provides an opportunity for a president to understand the problems confronting the country and develop a strategy for addressing them, while a second term, if granted by voters, could allow further implementation of those plans.
