President Muhammadu Buhari Saturday sounded a note of warning to groups agitating for the carving out of Biafra from Nigeria, saying his administration will confront and crush them.
The President urged them to perish such thoughts, reiterating that the corporate existence of Nigeria as a single entity is not a subject of debate and will not be compromised under whatever guise or agitation from whatever quarters.
He gave the warning in an address at the investiture of the Obi of Onitsha, Igwe Nnaemeka Alfred Achebe, as the 7th Chancellor of Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria.
Buhari, who was represented by the Minister of State for Education Anthony Onwuka, assured that the menace of insurgency and actions of those agitating for the dismemberment of the country would be surmounted.
According to him, “The country is currently facing challenges of insurgency and other forms of insecurity that have become a threat to Nigerians to live in their country and be educated in their country. The security situation in the country entails that every Nigerian must discharge his responsibility in bringing about peaceful coexistence.
“The menace of insurgency and actions of some people agitating for dismemberment of this country will be surmounted. I therefore sound a note of serious warning that the corporate existence of Nigeria as a single entity is not a subject of debate and will not be compromised. This administration will put in place sustainable programmes which will put our education system back on sound track.
“The university should, on its own part, key into the wave of change across the country. As pacesetters, the universities must avoid any corrupt practices.”
In his address, Igwe Achebe, who promised to give his all to advance the cause of the institution, decried persistent fuel scarcity in the country.
“We spend unbelievable amounts importing petrol and subsidising its retail price while our three refineries with adequate capacity to meet our national requirement are literally moribund, despite huge sums spent on endless turn-around maintenance. Smaller and less endowed countries successfully operate their own refineries optimally and do not suffer scarcity.
“Nigeria is probably the largest importer of electric generators in the world despite our endowment with natural sources of energy, such as petroleum, coal, hydro and solar energies, and the huge sums spent by successive governments on the power sector. On the other hand, a smaller country, Ghana, takes gas from Nigeria and generates most of its electricity requirements.
“Our food import bill, spent mostly on rice and wheat, is about $22 billion annually, yet our country is blessed with vast arable land and a large population of young, jobless people that can be usefully deployed into agriculture.
“Road construction in Nigeria is more expensive than most parts of the world, yet our roads are breaking down faster than we build them because the traditional mode for heavy haulage, namely, railways, pipelines and waterways, are comatose; a trailer load of petrol from Mosimi to Maiduguri causes more damage to our roads than the value of the product being transported. A majority of our state governments have recently taken the so-called ‘bailout loans’ for recurrent expenditure, meaning that future generations are being inflicted with the burden of the profligacy of the current generation,” he said.
In a related development, President Buhari said in Jos, Plateau State, that Nigeria had entered its glorious era in spite of insecurity and economic challenges.
He said on Saturday at the graduation of Senior Executive Course 37 of the National Institute of Policy and Strategic Studies (NIPPS) in Kuru near Jos.
Represented by Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, Buhari said Boko Haram and other such insurgent groups around the country would soon be consigned to history.
While acknowledging that some issues of agitations by some groups and sections in the country could not be ignored, he said creating employment opportunities would reduce the tension.
He charged the institute to conduct comprehensive study on causes of insurgency and how to build civil capacity to defeat mindless violence.
-Leadership
