Temitope Ajayi, Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, has swiftly responded to the inclusion of a presidential yacht in the 2023 Supplementary Budget, firmly denying any request from President Tinubu for such a vessel.
In his article titled “On Presidential Yacht And Other Matters”, Ajayi made it unequivocally clear that President Tinubu had never made any formal request for the acquisition of a yacht. This clarification comes in the wake of public concerns and inquiries regarding the allocation.
According to him, “The trending issues on social media since yesterday are two items in the 2023 supplementary budget. One is the provision for a presidential yacht in the supplementary budget by the Navy and the other is over N6 billion for vehicles to the State House.
“It is important to state clearly that President Bola Tinubu didn’t ask for a presidential yatch and I doubt he needs one to perform the functions of his office. From what I know, the request for a yacht, however it is named or couched in the budget is from the Navy and they must have operational reasons for why it is required.,” he noted.
The presence of a presidential yacht in the budget has generated significant interest and speculation, with many questioning the necessity and rationale behind this allocation. In response, Ajayi recognized the public’s right to seek transparency and accountability in government spending and assured that the matter would undergo a thorough review.
He noted further, “It is important to say that journalism should enrich public enlightenment and not create an atmosphere of siege. It is poor reporting to always reduce State House budgetary provisions to the President and Vice President. When the State House makes provision for vehicles, it is reported as if it is the President that will use all the vehicles or eat all the food when a provision is made for food and catering services. We have had such inaccurate reporting in the past. A President and Vice President cannot, for any reason, spend N20 million naira to eat in a year if it is about the food they will eat as first and second families. How much food can a person really eat? Yet, we will read headlines that Tinubu, Buhari, Jonathan or whoever the President is wants to spend N5billion on food and catering in a year when in actual fact such budgetary provisions are made to accommodate many state events, meetings, hosting of VIPs, foreign dignitaries, and even visits by other Head of States, and o bilateral and multilateral meetings that the State House will deal with in a given year.”
