President Bola Tinubu, for the umpteenth time, has assured that terrorist and bandit groups tormenting the North would be eliminated.
He lamented that the dysfunction inherited over decades fractured bonds and strained unity.
Tinubu, who was represented by the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Abbas Tajudeen stated this at the 25th Anniversary (Silver Jubilee) of the Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF) and the launch of the forum’s Endowment Fund on Saturday in Kaduna.
The Special Adviser on Media and Publicity to the Speaker, Musa Krishi in a statement issued yesterday said insecurity troubles him more than anything else in Nigeria.
Tinubu stressed that though his administration inherited the security challenges, he was working round the clock to address them with the urgency required.
He added: “Nothing troubles me more gravely than the security crisis bedevilling Nigeria, especially Northern Nigeria.
“Affliction in any part of the country is a setback for every part. We cannot prosper when one limb of the national body is paralysed.
“The layers and sophistication of the security challenges we inherited are daunting, but what should inspire confidence is the urgency with which my administration is pursuing solutions.”
“There has never been a time when the North more urgently needed honest, courageous voices. Yes, there have been missteps. Yes, there have been moments of drift. But we cannot say the North has failed unless we abandon our responsibility to be our brothers’ and sisters’ keepers.
“We fail the day we sleep comfortably while millions sleep with empty bellies, the day fear becomes a permanent companion for travellers moving from one village to another.
“But let no one believe that hope is lost. The dysfunction inherited over decades fractured bonds and strained unity. Yet the ethnic and religious diversity gathered here today is a declaration of the collective resolve to overcome polarisation and resist any agenda designed to divide.
Speaking on the insecurity in parts of the North, the President said, “We are not only determined to ensure that terrorist and bandit groups tormenting the North are eliminated, we are equally committed to reversing the region’s economic decline.”
Tinubu emphasised that every generation is visited by a calling peculiar to it.
According to him, For some, it was to reclaim this nation from the restraints of colonial domination. For others, it was to design the architecture of a democracy that could hold our diversity together. For yet others, it was to define the moral and social character of a people emerging into modernity.”