Former Ogun State Governor, Olusegun Osoba, has declared that God chose Bola Tinubu to be Nigeria’s first progressive president.
Osoba made the comment in an interview with ARISE TV yesterday while reacting to claims that the late M.K.O Abiola’s portrait ought to have been unveiled during the Democracy Day event on June 12 in place of Tinubu’s.
He said: “I think you will recall that the same Lagos State Government in which President Bola Tinubu is fully involved in, has done a giant portrait of M.K.O Abiola at Ikeja interchange and did a garden where there will be many major political rallies.
“Therefore, I should believe that M.K.O Abiola was the first to be honoured with a giant statue and if you consider the fact that President Tinubu is the first ever progressive politician to be elected as president of this country.
“I see it as a symbol that President Tinubu was virtually chosen by God to be the president because if you look at his emergence, he was not supposed to be president.
“The party was not on his side. A substantial part of the then government, of which we are the same, was not on his side.’’
Rising inflation: Adulterated foods flooding Nigerian markets FCCPC warns
As Nigerians battle with the harsh economic situation in the country, the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) has raised the alarm at the increasing sale of adulterated and contaminated foods in the markets.
Acting Executive Vice Chairman of the Commission, Dr Adamu Abdullahi, said in Abuja yesterday, that some traders were engaging in various forms of adulteration not minding the health implications on consumers.
Abdullahi said this at a one-day sensitisation for traders, farmers, Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), and the public on the forceful ripening of fruits, adulterated palm oil, contaminated meat, and grains.
He said the move was to ensure a healthier society in line with President Bola Tinubu’s ‘Renewed Hope Agenda’.
He said the Acts that established the Commission gave it the powers to evacuate fake and adulterated products from the markets to prevent consumers from purchasing them.
“We have allowed the love of money to supersede everything that we do. We will go to the markets to sensitise the traders, and educate the public and sellers that adulterated and fake products are not allowed in the markets and if they see any, they have somewhere to report.
”We are going to markets in the states, the grassroots, farms to find out the sharp practices going on and to ensure we get a healthier society in line with President Tinubu’s Renewed Hope Agenda.
”We have to ensure that the goods in the markets are according to the standard that they should be,” he said.
An official of the Federal Ministry of Health and Social Welfare, Femi Stephen described adulteration as the addition of substandard substances that have the same properties as the foodstuff in which they are mixed.
According to Stephen, palm oil, is being adulterated with dye, lard (animal fat from pork), and transformer oil (paraffin), noting that the adulteration had caused various health challenges such as abdominal pain, nausea, brain damage, stomach disorder, cardiac arrest, liver disease, and breathing difficulties.
He also urged farmers to seek experts’ guidance in the application of pesticides to avoid poisoning.
Dr Promise Ogbonna from the National Agency for Food, Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) said that forceful ripening of fruits was detrimental to health.
Ogbonna said that calcium carbide used for forceful ripening of fruits were arsenic and phosphorus which had been said to be carcinogenic.
The Vice-President, North Central, National Association of Nigerian Traders (NANTS), Dr Edozie Ugwu, commended the FCCPC for the sensitisation.
Ugwu said that many Nigerians had lost their vital body organs to the adulteration of food.
He said the market associations would collaborate with the Commission and other government agencies to ensure that the law penalised any trader found wanting in the practice.
”What we intend to do is to take this back and sensitise our traders on the importance of avoiding these adulterated foods.
”We plead that this be extended to various markets,” he said.
The various market associations, including market women associations and members of the Food and Hygiene Association of Nigeria, were present at the event.
(Source: NAN)
