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The Social Democratic Party’s, SDP, presidential candidate for 2023, Adewole Adebayo, has criticized the Bola Ahmed Tinubu-led Federal Government for adopting IMF and World Bank policies they had protested against during Goodluck Jonathan’s administration.
In a post on his X account, Mr Adebayo lamented that the present administration were the pursuing policies even with less humanity.
He wrote: “I opposed the Buhari-Tinubu farce that time, and I oppose the same thing now. As Buhari and Tinubu, and others were opposing Jonathan in 2014, they too were lobbying the same IMF, World Bank, etc for political support based on the same policies Jonathan was already implementating against his own wish, just to please the same IMF.
“As SDP presidential candidate, it is common knowledge that I opposed subsidy removal, floating of the naira, and many of the policies adopted by Tinubu, Atiku and Obi. Instead I called for the full implementation of Chapter 2 of the Constitution fundamental objectives and directive principles of state policy.”
Speaking on the planned nationwide protest, Mr Adebayo urged Nigerian youths to seek alternative ways of expressing their grievances, especially through the ballots.
He said, “four year tenure is sacred if we must avoid chaos, protests have no ideological basis for the protest sponsors follow the same neolibéral policies and you must vote wisely next time.”
“A protest is already a protest if you voice out disagreement in any lawful forum or media. Once you organise a mass protest to challenge pure policy measures and their natural fallouts, you are doing politics, and the other side can originate counter protests.
“In the case of Nigeria and Kenya, you won’t achieve anything substantial because the major political forces on both sides of the protests agree on neolibéral economic policies whose inevitable consequences are what they are protesting against.
“It is more sustainable to organise alternative policies to use to bring other ideological politics into power and change bad policies of the Neolibéral economic policies, whose inevitable consequences are what they are protesting against.”
