Okai: President Has Failed Woefully to Secure the Nation
An activist and Peoples Democratic Party’s House of Representatives candidate in 2023 poll, Austin Okai, in this interview with Juliet Akoje, says President Muhammadu Buhari has done nothing to stem the tide of insecurity in the country. Excerpt:
The spate of insecurity in the country generally is on the increase and as a very strong vocal voice in the society, what is your message to President Muhammadu Buhari concerning insecurity in the land? He is unnecessarily being stubborn; he is not doing anything about it. As I am talking to you, it is getting to seven months that some students were abducted from Katsina, they have not yet been found. What of the train attack, you are aware of the train attack between Abuja and Kaduna, the victims are still being held in the hands of the abductors. You can’t tell us that they don’t know what is going on, it is becoming alarming and we see it as business as usual.
If somebody like me is even in the national assembly, I will press more to ensure the president talks to Nigerians about the spate of kidnapping and killing, it is unusual, it is uncalled for, for a president who is a former general and the nation is insecured under him and he sees it as a normal thing, it is an aberration and everyone of us must stand up to it, you can’t govern a nation with this kind of condition. And this has shown that truly they lack the capacity to rule. Thank God February 18, 2023 is coming and Nigerians are eager to effect changes but even at that, we must call a spade a spade, he has failed woefully, he has failed to keep to his constitutional responsibilities, the oath he swore to protect Nigeria’s integrity, to ensure security of lives and properties, he has failed.
Today as I am talking to you, the sit-at-home order in the south east is well being observed even by the government agencies and parastatals and he is not doing anything about it.
Killings across the six geopolitical zones, no zone is safe anymore because of President Muhammadu Buhari’s government; he finds it difficult to fire those he is supposed to fire, the National Security Adviser is still there despite the resolution by the national assembly that he should fire the man. The NSA is the custodian of the Nigerian information and intelligence gathering, processing and he acts on it, until that man leaves, because he has so far demonstrated that he lacks the capacity to be the National Security Adviser of the president.
Until there is an end to it, the government must keep changing hands and now that he has refused to hire and fire, it shows that he is comfortable with it; therefore he cannot be exonerated from the ongoing crimes against Nigerians.
We are approaching that time of the year where the people will be electing their leaders; what is your message to the youth specifically because in most cases of electoral malpractices and all that, the youth are said to be behind some of these things. What is your message to the masses concerning the 2023 election?
Whoever we think, we have tested so many of them and if you observed some of them are our grandfather’s mates, they enjoyed their own life, they are enjoying our father’s opportunity and now they want to also take over our own chances. And that is why people like me stood up, I am standing up tall to ensure that the constituency which has 80% of the votes as Nigerians, 80% of the eligible voters fall into the age of the youth and unfortunately we are under represented.
Look at the cabinet of President Buhari, is there any youth among the ministers, none. The highest thing they can give you is one SSA where you don’t even have a port folio or some of them don’t even have an office. Where the critical decisions are being taken, the youths are not there.
Now that you are planning my own tomorrow and I am not there, how do you know what I want? They don’t hear from us, most of them use the old methods as it was obtainable in the 70’s, in the 80’s and that is obsolete. The world is changing and we must effect changes too. I know experience matters most but what is wrong in having all the Ministers of State as young ones, what is wrong in having 90% of the people in the House of Representatives to be within the age of 45, 50, 45 to 35, what is wrong? We should be involved in planning our future, we shouldn’t just be used only for election malpractice, thuggery, destruction of election materials. No, this is our time. At what time did Yakubu Gowon became a president, ditto Ibrahim Babangida, all of them were within the age of youth. President Buhari became a governor at a younger age, he became a minister at a younger age, he even became a president but up till now, he is still our president when some of us have graduated and still looking for jobs.
So unless we speak in one language, nobody should come and define the youth any more in the name of religion, this is a Muslim, we should stand by him, he is our brother, this one is a Christian, we should stand by him because he is a Christian, he is our Christian brother, we say no to that; let us talk sense into ourselves.
What do we want? is this a country? is there any future for us? is this the type of country we want to live for our children yet unborn with what we are going through? And if we must say no to that, to have a better Nigeria for our children yet unborn, then it is now we should rise up, the time is now for us to rise up, let us get massive orientation about the APC and let us effect change of government in a democratic way by voting out those that have failed, by voting out the party that has failed.