Former Minister of Transportation, Rotimi Amaechi, says the standard of living in Nigeria has become worse under President Bola Tinubu than his predecessor, under whom he served in the cabinet.
Amaechi was minister of transportation under late president Muhammadu Buhari between 2015 to 2023.
The ex-Rivers State governor spoke on Tuesday during a protest against the rejection of real-time transmission of election results at the national assembly.
The demonstration, which is being led by civil society groups and political figures, is calling for amendments to the Electoral Act, particularly the inclusion of mandatory real-time electronic transmission of election results ahead of the 2027 general election.
Addressing protesters and journalists at the venue, Amaechi, who defected from the All Progressives Congress (APC) to the African Democratic Congress (ADC), criticised Tinubu’s administration for worsening economic conditions and alleged corruption.
“Is life easier now than when I was in the APC? Life is worse now than during the former President Buhari regime,” Amaechi said.
“In Buhari’s time, at least, even though we were planning to remove subsidy, we had better plans for citizens.
“The corruption here is too much. They are stealing. I heard there’s a $16 billion road project awarded without due process. I left APC already and they will not win.”
“I don’t know whether there was corruption back then, but the corruption here… let’s see if Tinubu will win again in 2027.”
The protests at the national assembly complex began on Monday, with Peter Obi, presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the 2023 election, leading one group of demonstrators.
On Wednesday, the senate retained the provision for the electronic transfer of election results as contained in the electoral act 2022.
During the consideration of the bill, the red chamber also rejected proposals for real-time results transmission and a 10-year ban on vote buyers, opting instead to maintain existing sanctions of fines or jail terms.
However, some members of the upper chamber have clarified that the bill enjoyed the backing of the majority in the senate.
Despite that widespread backing, the senate did not adopt the real-time transmission of election results sought by some advocates.
Instead, it retained the existing wording from the 2022 electoral act, under which results are to be transferred “in a manner as prescribed by the commission”.
