Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye, Abuja

Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, has said though the PDP founded anti-corruption agencies of the Economic and Financial Crime Commission (EFCC), and the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC), they had intended to keep them as toys or bulldogs which teeth had been removed.

He said the previous administration never had any intention of taking the war against corruption as far as the Muhammadu Buhari administration has done, hence the need for Nigerians to be weary of them come 2019z

Shehu in an article titled ‘the Real Price of “Changing the Change” (1)’, said, the talk about “CHANGING THE CHANGE” by the PDP ahead of the 2019 elections means to reverse all the achievements of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).

According to him, the current administration has successfully fought corruption and has also abolished grand corruption at the top level, for which the international community was applauding him for.

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Shehu said, “The real meaning and cost of the “Changing the Change,” is that if they win the next election, they will not take us back to where we were in 2015, they will mostly reverse the progress the APC has brought to the nation. The main reason for the defeat of the PDP in 2015 was corruption.

“The present administration at the centre led by President Muhammadu Buhari has so far presented a corrupt-free image of itself. It has also succeeded in abolishing grand corruption at the top and as attested to by the American President, Donald Trump.

“The government has significantly brought down the level of corruption in the whole country. It has, however, warned over and again that corruption was fighting back.”

According to the president’s media aide, “The real difference between the PDP and the current APC administration is that although they mouthed a flood of rhetoric against corruption, in fact rightfully lay the claim of founding the institutions now in the forefront of fighting corruption as a government, the EFCC and the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC), they had intended to keep them as toys or bulldogs which teeth had been removed. No, they never intended that the war against corruption would be taken this far.

“To change the change would mean that the teeth of the bulldog will be removed. It would then only bark but not bite,” Shehu said.