OPEN LETTER TO PRESIDENT MUHAMMADU BUHARI -BY LAYI DEINDE
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| President Muhammadu Buhari. |
You have a date with history, by justifying the confidence that the Nigerian citizens reposed in you. The people chose to stick with you, in place of those who offer immediate succour. The reason for this could be traceable to your track records, no doubt.
While reviewing trends of events in Nigeria, one could not but recall that the lives of citizens were under constant threats in a number of locations in Nigeria, with the security forces struggling to contain the ugly scenario. Clashes among people who have lived together for ages became a puzzle, hard to comprehend. And the cessation of hostilities, prior to the 2019 election period is curious enough.
At a point, a challenge was thrown out asking for a project that was conceived, and completed during your first tenure. Those who threw the challenge understood the normal project cycle. When the existence of such projects became manifest, they turned around to claim that those projects were initiated by the previous administration.
A consistent shout of "there is hunger in the land" rent the air, without any clear reference to its cause. We are not unmindful of efforts geared towards the eradication of hunger and or poverty in the land, but as much as you have done, a whole lot more still needs to be done.
A handful of foreign media institutions and related organizations gave jaundiced opinions about your regime, with no recourse to what you inherited, while keeping a blind eye on your modest strides in repositioning the national economy. Notable figures ditched your party for the opposition in a bid to wrest power from you. Cheap, disingenuous propaganda was the order of the day. An election you were declared to have convincingly won by defeating a combination of your opponents is being labelled as rigged. This is done to discredit your regime, no doubt.
Suddenly, violence in several parts of the country has resumed yet again! The security agencies in their usual manner are battling to contain them. The citizens remain the victims. The puzzle is once again here; why do we have hostilities at some point? What leads to its cessation, also?
We look up to your government, Your Excellency and your intelligence team to unravel this. The major contender to your position, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, aside from challenging your electoral victory legally, is also doing so much damage to the psyche of his supporters and a handful of Nigerians, thereby threatening the fragile peace in the land.
The legal process of challenging the election outcome is quite commendable. And one wonders what gains Atiku seeks to make by lobbying the government of the United States of America to delay the recognition of victory in the 2019 presidential elections?
In the light of these, your government should critically appraise the current violent situation in the country with a view bringing a halt to it. Nigerians look up to you to stir the ship of state, satisfactorily. To actualise this is to work with the best of men and women, who have what it takes for the discharge of their duties.
Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and his party are, to the best of my knowledge, not giving the best of "OPPOSITION". They are actually not used to it. What they do is take advantage of the flaws of your regime, majorly precipitated on the negative disposition of a few round pegs who found themselves in square holes.
The good people of Nigeria are anxious of a return of sanity, where laws are not broken at will as evident in several actions on display.
Mr. President, it is not a positive virtue that all your ministers and several other members of your cabinet served four years, save for Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), Mr. Babachir Lawal, who was shoved aside for official indiscretion.
Mr. President, as you may know, you have a social contract with Nigerians, which is on how to make the country better than how it was when you were given our collective mandate in 2015. And now that that mandate has been renewed in 2019, the best option would be to compensate the good people of Nigeria with good governance that would make the lives better.
I do trust, Mr. President, that following your renewed mandate, you would waste no time in swinging into action to put together a better team in your soon to be inaugurated administration to begin to embark on a road-map that would translate the country to the level that it truly and really deserves.
We count on your leadership to take Nigeria to the Promised Land.
· * Layi Deinde, a social crusader, wrote in from Lagos, Nigeria.
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