The National Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Felix Morka, has criticised former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar and the African Democratic Congress (ADC) spokesperson, Bolaji Abdullahi, describing them as lacking a proper understanding of Nigeria’s economic realities.
NEWSNGR reports that Morka made the remark during an interview on Arise News while reacting to comments by Atiku and Abdullahi on the removal of the petrol subsidy and the possibility of restoring it ahead of the 2027 general elections.
The APC spokesman accused the former Vice-President and his aide of either being uninformed about the economy or deliberately misrepresenting the issues surrounding subsidy.
“Bolaji Abdullahi and his principal, the former vice president, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, are clueless. They’re either utterly clueless or they’re just being very disingenuous,” Morka said.
Morka argued that discussions about restoring the subsidy often ignored the huge financial burden it would impose on the government.
He said subsidy should not be portrayed as a simple policy intervention because sustaining it required significant public funds and a clear financing plan.
“Every time they speak about the economy, they are tongue-tied. They’re not speaking like people who have any knowledge of how the country’s economy actually works,” he said.
Challenging Atiku to explain how he would finance a subsidy regime if elected in 2027, Morka said the former Vice-President needed to provide concrete figures rather than make broad promises.
“When Atiku says, ‘I’m going to give subsidy,’ I think that Atiku needs to sit down with his advisers and put numbers to that conversation,” he said.
He questioned whether Atiku intended to use Nigeria’s foreign reserves to finance petrol subsidies, calling the proposal economically irresponsible.
The APC spokesman also maintained that global market conditions, not Nigeria, influenced energy costs.
According to him, international crude oil prices and other factors in the global energy market contribute significantly to petrol prices in the country.
Morka said any discussion about fuel pricing must therefore take into account the broader economic realities rather than focus solely on government intervention.
Defending Tinubu’s economic reforms, Morka argued that the President inherited longstanding economic challenges rather than creating them.
He also reminded Atiku that he was a key political figure during the years the Peoples Democratic Party governed Nigeria before the APC came to power.
“Atiku Abubakar, for 16 years his party was in power, was one of the key actors, one of the star actors that decimated the economy of this country, that this president is fixing,” Morka said.
Morka also referred to Atiku’s past comments regarding expenditure in the power sector, alleging that the former Vice-President had acknowledged that $16 billion was spent without the expected electricity infrastructure being delivered.
He said the allegation stemmed from Atiku’s own admission and did not require a separate conviction.
The APC spokesman said Nigerians would ultimately judge the competing positions on the economy and determine whether the Tinubu administration’s reforms represented the better direction for the country.
