Rice claims: Resign, apologize to Nigerians now, PDP tells Ogbeh

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has urged the Minister of Agriculture, Chief Audu Ogbeh, to toe the path of honour and resign his cabinet position for allegedly portraying Nigeria as a lying nation by “deliberately falsifying claims relating to Nigeria’s relationship with Thailand,” on rice importation.

The party said the whole world was shocked when the ambassador of Thailand to Nigeria, Wattana Kuwongse, publicly denied informing the Minister that major rice mills were shutting down in Thailand as a result of drop in importation of rice by Nigeria as claimed by Ogbeh.

PDP National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, in a statement on Friday, said the development is a dent on the image of the All Progressives Congress (APC)-led administration.

“It is clear that the intention of the APC-led federal government was to use the Minister of Agriculture to mislead Nigerians into believing that the Buhari-led administration has achieved national self-sufficiency in food production; a stunt which fell flat on its face and brought the nation into international ridicule.

“We charge the Minister of Agriculture to toe the path of honour and immediately resign and tender an unreserved apology to Nigerians.

“Nigerians will recall that the same minister, last year, programmed the exporting of rotten yams and brought the country into international disrepute, all in the desperate bid of APC interests to score cheap political points and push their ill-lucked 2019 re-election bid.

“Earlier this week, President Buhari’s handlers made the nation a laughing stock in the international arena when they railroaded the President into offering to help Ghana in the fight against corruption, when back home, the APC controlled federal government is an ocean of corruption and false claims,” the statement read in part.

The party also said “Nigerians have not forgotten how this government lied that it had recovered the abducted Dapchi girls only the report to turn false and frustrated prompt effort that would have led to the recovery of our daughters.

“Nigerians have seen that the hallmark of the APC government is falsehood, deception and lies but they are shocked that government officials could invent and peddle bare-faced lies in the international arena.

“Nigerians can now see the weight of our earlier caution to always cross-check any information or performance indices issued to them by the Presidency or officials of the APC government no matter how highly placed.”