Nigerians to Buhari: Show us your WAEC, other academic credentials

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By Anthony Ogbonna

Major General Muhammadu Buhari (rtd),

Reactions have continued to trail President Muhammadu Buhari’s claim again that his academic credentials are with the Nigerian military.

Read: Breaking: Buhari fails to provide WAEC certificate, says “all my academic credentials with military”

President Buhari failed to provide his academic credentials to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, as one of the requirements to qualify to contest elective positions in the country.

President Buhari, in an affidavit sworn to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, explained why he failed to submit his academic credentials as a precondition to being eligible to contest the 2019 election.

According to Buhari, “I am the above named person and the deponent of this affidavit herein. All my academic qualification documents as filled in my Presidential form, APC/001/2015 are currently with the Secretary of the Military Board as of the time of this affidavit.”

President Buhari had, during the 2015 election which he eventually won, presented INEC with the same excuse, saying the military is in possession of his academic credentials. But, the army, through the then director of army public relations, Olajide Laleye, had denied that the military was in possession of Buhari’s academic credentials.

In a release then, the army had said, “Records available indicate that Major General M Buhari applied to join the military as a Form Six student of the Provincial Secondary School, Katsina on 18 Oct 61.

“His application was duly endorsed by the Principal of the school, who also wrote a report on him and recommended him to be suitable for military commission.

“It is a practice in the NA that before candidates are shortlisted for commissioning into the officers’ cadre of the Service, the Selection Board verifies the original copies of credentials that are presented. However, there is no available record to show that this process was followed in the 1960s.”

However, Nigerians have disagreed with Mr. President, with many saying President Buhari ought to have collected his credentials since the 2015 election when he came under criticism for not having them.

The Nigerians who took to the micro-blogging site, Twitter, to express their various opinions, many of which are not in support of the president’s claim, said Buhari should present his credentials to give flesh to his integrity claim.

Below are their tweets:

For number one bestselling author and former aide to ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, Pastor Reno Omokri, “Other than the 11 million jobs he lost, the only jobs @MBuhari could create in almost 4 years were the jobs he gave the 13 SANs that he engaged to go to court to prevent him from presenting his certificate to Nigerians. Now he is telling INEC a cock and bull story! #RenosDarts”

For the former Aviation Minister and chieftain of the PDP, Femi Fani-Kayode, “Once again Buhari has refused to submit his WAEC certificate to INEC. Once again he says that it is with the military authorities. Even though he has been Commander in Chief for the last few years he has been unable to retrieve them. May God save Nigeria from this man.”

For Kola Ologbondiyan‏ @officialKolaO, National Publicity  Secretary of the PDP, “Integrity demands that you write to military authorities asking them to forward your credentials to INEC Even @MBuhari followers are not prepared to accept NEPA Bill for WAEC in 2019 So, Mr President, Wey your certificate?”

For Deji Adeyanju, Convener, Concerned Nigerians group, “Dear President Buhari,

Permission to lead a PROTEST on your behalf to demand for the release of your WAEC certificate by the military. We are willing to collect teargas for you sir.”

Source: https://www.vanguardngr.com/2018/10/nigerians-to-buhari-show-us-your-waec-other-academic-credentials/