NATIONAL DISGRACE: Tinubu Hiding In France While Macron Is At UNGA Fighting For France – ADC Blasts President

The African Democratic Congress [ADC] has described as a national disgrace President Bola Tinubu’s decision to remain on vacation in France while his host, President Emmanuel Macron, has left Paris for New York to attend the United Nations General Assembly [UNGA].

The party said it is embarrassing that at a time world leaders are advancing their countries’ interests at UNGA, Nigeria’s President is holed up in the French capital while his host has left to pursue his own country’s national interest.

Tinubu, who is currently on annual vacation in Europe since August 30, had delegated Vice-President Kashim Shettima to attend the global event. This is the third consecutive time that Shettima would stand in for the President.

In a brutal statement on Tuesday, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi, National Publicity Secretary of the ADC, said, “The irony would be amusing if it were not a national disgrace.”

He said, “President Tinubu cannot be vacationing in Paris while President Macron is in New York representing France and expect Nigerians to accept that it is okay for their President to continue to hang around in a country after the host has left to attend to more important things. This is not merely poor optics. It is a national embarrassment.”

Abdullahi described the continued absence of both President Tinubu and Vice-President Shettima from the country at a time Nigerians are confronting worsening insecurity, unemployment and an unbearable cost-of-living crisis as a dangerous disregard for the Constitution.

He called on the Presidency and the National Assembly to provide a direct answer to one question: “Who presently exercises the constitutional powers of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, and under what provision of the Constitution?”

He cited Section 145 of the Constitution which requires the President, when proceeding on vacation for a period of up to 21 days, to transmit a written declaration to the President of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, after which the Vice-President performs the functions of Acting President.

He said President Tinubu left Nigeria on August 30 and has now been away for more than 21 days, and demanded to know whether the required declaration was transmitted. He asked why the National Assembly has ignored Section 145 if it was not transmitted.

The ADC spokesman also rejected the Presidency’s explanation that the President was on a “working vacation” or that the Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Senator George Akume, would represent President Tinubu at official events.

He dismissed it as an absurdity that raises more questions than it answers. He said representing the President at events and ceremonies does not confer constitutional powers, and that the SGF is a mere appointee who may attend events or deliver speeches but cannot exercise the constitutional powers of the President or Acting President.

He said, “Representation is not governance. Attendance at official functions is not presidential authority. Nigeria cannot be governed through ceremonial proxies, telephone calls and press statements issued from foreign capitals.”

He added that the claim that the President has continued to direct national affairs from abroad only compounds the absurdity, saying there is no constitutional category known as a working vacation and that presidential authority cannot be transferred by convenience, protocol or press statement.