Pastor Bakare - With this Jonathan, " I cannot see any hope anywhere in Nigeria"

The Convener of the Save Nigeria Group (SNG), Pastor Tunde Bakare has accused the President Goodluck Jonathan regime of promoting corruption and the rule of impunity in the country.

Speaking at a press conference in Lagos on Sunday, Bakare said all that the current administration does in terms of policies and programmes are tailored towards fostering corruption.

On the implementation of the Subsidy Re-investment and Empowerment Programme (SURE-P), he said the programme was another drain pipe on the nation's economy saying it was put together to enrich members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

According to him, rather than build necessary public institutions that would safeguard the fight against corruption and impunity, the country has further slipped into the cesspit of the scourge as he stated that government and its functionaries look the other way rather than punish those found culpable of engaging in corrupt practices.

"The situation that we find ourselves today can be likened to that of Ali Baba and the forty thieves, in Nigeria today, it is the case of the more you steal the bolder you become to face the system which has become comatose to deal with the scourge," Bakare said.

Bakare based his assertion on the controversy generated by the recent presidential pardon accorded former Bayelsa State Governor, Chief Diepreye Alamesieghah by the National Council of State, saying it was a tacit approval that the current government supports and encourage corruption.

While refraining from making further comments on the issue, Bakare who promised to formally make the position of the group known later stated however that "It is not a question of whether Alamesieghah has stolen but what has become the lots of Bayelsa State since then."

Lamenting the sorry state of the country, he however stated that the current political elites have demonstrated its lack of capacity to bring about the needed change that the country deserves saying, rather, what the country needed was a total cleansing of the system.

"With the way things are now, I cannot see any hope anywhere in the country except through total and thorough cleansing of the present system. It will come but the form it will take I don't know, show me any country that has developed without such things happening, the same thing will happen here." He said.