Presidential Jet Request: Insinuations among public, ‘anticipatory blackmail’ — Akpabio

The President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio, had on Thursday dismissed the insinuations for the approval of new Presidential jets, yet, tentatively gave an anticipatory approval to the non-existing request for purchase of presidential jets for President Bola Tinubu and his vice, Kashim Shettima.

This was as he declared that the Senate would not fold its hands and allow President Tinubu to die like the Vice President of Malawi and Iranian President.

Akpabio gave the indication at an emergency session of the upper chamber which was convened to consider an extension of the implementation period for the capital component of N21.83 trillion 2023 budget, and those of the N2.17 trillion 2023 supplementary budget.

The Senate President who reacted earlier to reports in a section of the media where he was credited to have said that the Red Chamber would approve the purchase of a new presidential jet regardless of the economic hardship faced by Nigerians, added that no such request for a new jet has come before the Senate

He however said the upper legislative chamber would without delay approve any such request when it comes to avert the fate suffered by the Vice President of Malawi and the President of Iran who died in aeroplane and helicopter crashes respectively.

While reacting to the Senate Leader, Opeyemi Bamidele (Ekiti Central)’s observation on insinuations on social media about the issue of the presidential jets, Akpabio cautioned him against responding to social media because the social media is garbage in, garbage out.

After insisting that the Senate never received any correspondence from the presidency that relates to the presidential jet, he said, “At the same time, we will also take cognisance of the duties of Mr. President if his vehicle is bad, we will repair the vehicle. If his plane is bad, we will approve money for the repair of the plane. So that is not an issue.

“I was in Zanzibar attending the inter- parliamentary union meetings when that information went out, that the Senate president has said he will approve a brand-new plane for the president irrespective of whether Nigerians are suffering or not suffering.

“There was never a time such a statement came from me because I’ve never had any correspondence to approve a plan or not approve a plan and I did not want to answer, but they went further to generate it and then they went round as if I was saying that I did not care about the Nigerian people, I did not do this.

“We care about the president, we care about the Nigerian people. We will approve things that will
benefit the Nigerian people. We will approve things that will improve the living standards of
the people.

“There is nothing before us. I don’t think you should worry about it.

“Somebody came here and said that he was quoting from BBC that it was what I said in Senator Munguno’s house that the statement was false and should be disregarded. That I was now saying that I would not approve. That is what you may call anticipatory blackmail.

“The purveyors of the story know very well that maybe there is a problem with the presidential fleet and that where they will go to will be the Parliament and so they are now trying to do anticipatory blackmail for us, if they bring it, we should not look into it.

“So I think we should ignore them and focus on what we are doing here. I’ve read the president’s
correspondences to us. There was nothing touching on a plane or no plane, but I can tell you that when you hear stories such as the death of the vice president of Malawi as a result of defective plane, and then you hear stories such as the death of the president of Iran, as a result of defective aircraft, in fact, this time it was a helicopter and all that, We shouldn’t ever dream and allow such to be our portion. It wouldn’t be.

“The Senate is very responsible. The National Assembly is very responsible, he added.