The Igbo Socio-cultural group, Ohanaeze Ndigbo has reacted to comment by Presidential spokesperson, Garba Shehu that members of the ‘cabal’ in the presidency are not hungry individuals and do deserve to be respected.
Shehu, while appearing as a guest on a Channel television programme on Christmas day, dismissed false belief that the cabal manipulates the president, saying “they are respectable Nigerians who deserve respect because they have achieved a lot.
“A lot of people who are being dragged into this cabal thing are respectable Nigerians who have achieved a lot for themselves and for the nation. They are not there as hungry people out to grab things for themselves,” he said.
“Nigerians have formed the practice by labeling people that are in some advisable positions of the president as a cabal.
“People should not be labelled negatively simply because they have offered themselves to support the president of this country,” he said.
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Reacting, however, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, through its Publicity Secretary, Chief Uche Achi-Ogbaga said; “You see, when you do the right thing in a wrong way, it becomes wrong. The issue is not about being hungry or well-fed. It is about the integrity of the government, it is about conventionality, law and civility. The taxpayers’ money is used to pay the retinue of ministers, presidential advisers, assistants and other aides.
“They are the official government decision policy or decision-makers. Yet, you abandon them to depend or take instructions from an underhand body called the cabal. It is unfortunate that Garba Shehu, whose utterances are presumed as that of the President, could say that blatantly.
“From the American experience, it is enough to impeach the President if it is established, as in the present case, that it came from the presidency.
“It is absurd to jettison the Federal Executive Council and other lawful bodies to take orders from an ethnic and prejudice-infested cabal. It smells to high heavens.”
