A chieftain of the ruling All Progressives Congress, Prof. Pat Utomi, says the founding fathers of the party would reform it to correct some of its lapses.

Utomi said in New York that the party had to be reformed to refocus it to its founding ideals.

The founder and former presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress said some of the founding fathers were more committed to building APC as an enduring political party.



According to him, however, some people are more interested in taking titles in the party, rather than building it.

“I’m a member of the APC; I’m one of the real founding members of the APC.

“Forget that because some of us committed more to building real stuff and others rushed to take titles, but we founded the APC.

“It’s not been what we thought it would be; let’s be very honest, the party has under-performed, the party’s structure has been poor.

“The party leadership has been poor; government and the party have not worked well together.

“But we shall reform it from within by God’s grace and make it work better.

“We have to wish on God’s grace and hope that things work differently. Anything that works, that will make a difference, I will do,” he said.

Utomi, a professor of political economy and former Special Adviser in the Second Republic government of former president Shehu Shagari, said he was not ambitious for political power.

According to him, however, he is more interested in whatever will bring relief to the Nigerians from the hardship they have faced under successive administrations.

“All my career, all my life, I’ve always been willing to do anything no matter how sacrificial it is to advance the common good of our people.

“The thing that I have never cared for is pursuit of power for the sake of power. I’m not looking for anything, I’m quite happy with the fortunes that my circumstance has brought to me.

“But if there is a serious group of people who really are motivated by one thing and one thing alone – service to the people.

“Making it a kind of life we live better, more harmony among the people of Nigeria, I will be very pleased to do anything – Councillor, President, just name anything.

“So I have no problem about engaging for serving if it will lead to real progress, not to a title, I don’t believe in titles.

“We must begin to look at leaders who don’t seek titles and who can make a difference without a title,” he said.

Utomi who is the Director of Lagos Business School decried what he described as “the triumph of politics” and the “politicisation of everything” in the country.

According to him, “We are not thinking development, not thinking growth of our country, not thinking our children and their future, we’re thinking politics.

“Many of the people in positions of authority are so consumed by politics; they don’t think about the Nigerian people.

“I think this obsession with who is winning the next election, can take Nigeria completely away from the path of development.

“If you say ‘good morning’, they say ‘is he against Buhari, is he for Tinubu, is he a Jonathan person’; we don’t have public conversation of quality that can help us change our country for good.

“Take a very simple issue; the government is very concerned about corruption, nothing can more interest me than corruption because it’s done fundamental damage to Nigeria.

“But because of the triumph of politics, if you talk about corruption, you get the spin immediately because of the way we have managed the whole corruption issue, as a flood of issues.”

Source:
http://punchng.com/apc-has-under-performed-utomi/

“If you say ‘good morning’, they say ‘is he against Buhari, is he for Tinubu, is he a Jonathan person’; we don’t have public conversation of quality that can help us change our country for good.

Sarkii and the BMC crew described

That fact is as clear as the sky. Even the blind in nigeria can see that APC has failed.

Utomi with truth as always.

APC are bunch of old criminals coming together to form a party to pursue their selfish interest.

"They" will soon come and abuse him now those that refuse to accept the glaring failure of their lord and master Bubu.

Very strong statements he made:

“I’m a member of the APC; I’m one of the real founding members of the APC.

“Forget that because some of us committed more to building real stuff and others rushed to take titles, but we founded the APC.

“It’s not been what we thought it would be; let’s be very honest, the party has under-performed, the party’s structure has been poor.

“The party leadership has been poor; government and the party have not worked well together.

E pain utomi...no appointment for u

Infact below below expectation self. A true totalitarinism will help Nigeria, Except for that, Democrarcy upon Democracy means suffering upon suffering. Believe me!

I agree and this is mainly because Baba has been very slow in taking concrete actions on key economic and social issues. It looks like we really crawled under Baba if you compare with the activeness of PYO who's working like he is in a hurry to get things done ASAP.
But if you actively follow developmental projects, you'll agree that APC is definitely putting us on the right path of development compared to the grand looters, PDP.

APC have sincerely performed lower than expectation but in the context of things, they have performed way better than PDP.

The only people who miss PDP are those who are gained from them, those who are uneducated as to why we have found ourselves at this level and the bigots who are deliberately blinded to the FACTS.

Buhari and APC's impact will only be felt 8-12 years time. I personally have no regret that I campaigned for Buhari. When I was hyping him for the presidency I knew no matter what he does, we won't feel the impact positively as such and it is due to the decay in the statement.

Buhari will surely lay the foundation for a better Nigeria but won't be able to complete the building project.

Reposted.

I reckon APC has fallen below expectations.

But the problem is, making the Nigerian economy better is going to involve a lot of sacrifices....which means running a hard austerity type economy, ending excessive government spending, tackling corruption at the root, and taking us away from oil dependency.

Things that APC is not doing...because of APC...and by extension Nigerians....desire to run an economy based on sharing money.And I doubt that the Nigerian opposition....balkanized as it is....has any better ideas.

In short, Nigerians are resistant to ideas that might actually improve the economy. See the resistance to GEJ's attempt to remove fuel subsidies(which if they had been done back in 2012....by now we would have had a more prosperous hydrocarbon sector) or the resistance to the anti-corruption efforts of this government(which basically amounts to sheep voting for every day to be declared Sallah/Christmas day...and volunteering en masse for the butcher's block). We are a nation of people who want to chop......and our politicians reflect our choices.

Until we change our attitude from chop and quench to produce or suffer.....we are not going to make progress.

..,APC has not performed at all...This is the worst administration in the history of this country.

Does the President even know what is in d APC manifesto?

abescom:
APC have sincerely performed lower than expectation but in the context of things, they have performed way better than PDP.

The only people who miss PDP are those who are gained from them, those who are uneducated as to why we have found ourselves at this level and the bigots who are deliberately blinded to the FACTS.

Buhari and APC's impact will only be felt 8-12 years time. I personally have no regret that I campaigned for Buhari. When I was hyping him for the presidency I knew no matter what he does, we won't feel the impact positively as such and it is due to the decay in the statement.

Buhari will surely lay the foundation for a better Nigeria but won't be able to complete the building project.

Well, I am a bit disappointed in APC

1.They kept subsidies on fuel for far too long....at the expense of our economic development.

2.They are not giving Power...ok Power is now in private hands...the attention it needs.How's about joining hands with DISCOS and GENCOS to take a big loan for power infrastructure?

3.I wish they would take a big loan for infrastructure projects in the transport sector...especially railways

4.Education: Sorry....but fees have to go up....because we can no longer fund education adequately. Universities, for example, need at least N2 trillion pa to function adequately. The budget for education as a whole this year is not up to half of that.

5.State governors need to sit up.

6.We need to urgently diversify. No buts. And we need to modernize our farming sector. Subsistence farming cannot feed Nigeria adequately (which is a big reason why we are importing agric stuff in the first place).

PDP was a mess....but APC can do much better.

Ngokafor:



..,APC has not performed at all...This is the worst administration in the history of this country.

You weren't around for the 1980's....when things were just as tough...

What we are experiencing is the effects of the oil price drop. We were there before....from 1970-82...we had a 'good economy'....until the big drop in oil prices of 1982....which led to economic crisis from 1983 to 2003(worsened by the SAP years of 1986-90, with a slight improvement owing to the brief oil price rise in 1991 due to Gulf War 1)...when oil began going up again.

Of course, this does not let the APC govt off the hook....you learn from history...and take appropriate measures....by investing in the productive capacity of our country.

9jakohai:


Well, I am a bit disappointed in APC

1.They kept subsidies on fuel for far too long....at the expense of our economic development.

2.They are not giving Power...ok Power is now in private hands...the attention it needs.How's about joining hands with DISCOS and GENCOS to take a big loan for power infrastructure?

3.I wish they would take a big loan for infrastructure projects in the transport sector...especially railways

4.Education: Sorry....but fees have to go up....because we can no longer fund education adequately. Universities, for example, need at least N2 trillion pa to function adequately. The budget for education as a whole this year is not up to half of that.

5.State governors need to sit up.

6.We need to urgently diversify. No buts. And we need to modernize our farming sector. Subsistence farming cannot feed Nigeria adequately (which is a big reason why we are importing agric stuff in the first place).

PDP was a mess....but APC can do much better.

Will be crazy to disagree with you here. My disappointment is PDP. I expected them to play a better opposition for our good but they have instead resort to sentimentalities.

But again can we blame PDP. The real blame is on those those h refuse to accept the fact that PDP got us into this mess and are using bigotry to try to sway people to their side.

If people have not bought into PDP's bigotry and their "we are the victim" mentality, they probably would have sat up.

olujastro:
I agree and this is mainly because Baba has been very slow in taking concrete actions on key economic and social issues. It looks like we really crawled under Baba if you compare with the activeness of PYO who's working like he is in a hurry to get things done ASAP.
But if you actively follow developmental projects, you'll agree that APC is definitely putting us on the right path of development compared to the grand looters, PDP.

Buhari is age is telling on his pace in doing this but this is why I want him to be in power till 2023 or till someone credible, who is to a great extent not corrupt is able to take over.

Should he die now, forget it, we will be back to where we were before him.

Ngokafor:



..,APC has not performed at all...This is the worst administration in the history of this country.

Ngo, let's talk

A misleading headline.

Igbos always lie

9jakohai:


You weren't around for the 1980's....when things were just as tough...

What we are experiencing is the effects of the oil price drop. We were there before....from 1970-82...we had a 'good economy'....until the big drop in oil prices of 1982....which led to economic crisis from 1983 to 2003(worsened by the SAP years of 1986-90, with a slight improvement owing to the brief oil price rise in 1991 due to Gulf War 1)...when oil began going up again.

Of course, this does not let the APC govt off the hook....you learn from history...and take appropriate measures....by investing in the productive capacity of our country.

Very few people know their history. Kudos!

kenny 987 if you want to talk, please try & make sense.

Have they performed before?

I hate it when anybody says APC under perform... the word perform should never be in same sentence with APC....the right word for APC expedition in Nigeria Affairs is Destroy, Destruction, Destroyed....depending on how grounded you are grammatically.

Under perfomance is an under statement

Better than pdp though.

They have performed averagely given the condition they met.

ephi123:
"They" will soon come and abuse him now those that refuse to accept the glaring failure of their lord and master Bubu.

Very strong statements he made:

That one is sure Luareeta Onochie will soon call him senile , the EFCC will soon say he is still owing Bank PHB and socket works

SalamRushdie:


That one is sure Luareeta Onochie will soon call him senile , the EFCC will soon say he is still owing Bank PHB and socket works

Exactly. That's the routine.

Even the zombies are stylishly saying "I am a bit disappointed", "They have performed averagely" "Baba has been very slow in taking concrete actions on key economic and social issues" too funny, you guys will eventually have no choice but to face reality FULLY. This is just the start.