The Rotimi Amaechi’s Voice [Listen], Nigeria Needs to Update Constitution

by Amaka Uche

I do hope the alleged Rotimi Amaechi’s voice, as reported by Premium Times is fake. Also, can someone explain to me why ministers and commissioners (paid by the citizens) are allowed by the Nigerian Constitution to serve in partisan Director-General positions of electoral campaigns?

The recording contains a portrayal of Mr Buhari as a dismal failure who has been unable to meet the expectations of various segments of the society, ending with a dismissal of Nigeria as a never-going-to-change hopeless nation.

The transcript of the recording reads: “These are not things you publish ooo. If you publish them, you will never sit with me any day.

“Three years of Buhari oo, everybody is crying, crying…pressmen are crying, farmers are crying, workers are crying, politicians are crying, students are crying, three years oo!

“The rate of poverty is very high. The people are hungry. Nigeria will never change!”

Across the nation, PDP and APC commissioners are appointed DGs of governorship campaigns, and at the presidential level, Rotimi Amaechi, a federal minister of transport, heads President Buhari election campaign.

Before you attack APC – this did not start with Buhari; from Obasanjo to Jonathan administrations, this has been the norm. A female minister headed the women wing of PDP while she was a minister!

As the alleged voice of Amaechi depicts, being partisan takes away any objectivity. That is why I think Nigeria should update the Constitution to make it illegal: if you are appointed into a federal or state cabinet, you cannot be involved in any direct partisan politics like running elections, as a Director-General, unless you resign your cabinet position. Unless we fix that, we will not have objectivity in service; one message for the public, one for the inner club.