By Aliyu Askira
Kano
A former chairman of Kazaure local government area of Jigawa state, Alhaji Saleh Yahaya Taki, has called on President Muhammadu Buhari to arrest and prosecute dealers of petroleum selling above government’s approved rates.
Speaking in an exclusive interview with Blueprint at the weekend in Kano, Taki said those selling petroleum products above government prices were criminals and saboteurs, and urged the President to identify them, withdraw their licences and prosecute them.
According to him, if this is done there will be sanity in the sector and those into this dubious practice will stop henceforth.
“It is not the duty of the President, once he fixes prices or regulates how certain things should be done, to again monitor how it should be implemented; he has Ministers, Advisers, Governors and other supporting staff to do this for him. None of our refineries were bombed. The petroleum minister should invite those who built the refineries to look at them and change what should be changed for them to work again, but corrupt officials of the refineries do not want government from repair them, so, they should be identified and prosecuted.”
He called senators to immediately remove Bukola Saraki as their president “since he is facing trial before a competent court of jurisdiction; this is the only reason our senators would concentrate on their jobs.”
Taki said he had to dump his former party, the PDP, to support President Buhari in 2015 “because PDP ruled Nigeria for 16 years and virtually destroyed the country and had nothing to offer again.”