The Arewa Consultative Forum (ACF), the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC), have faulted the comment made by President Goodluck Jonathan alluding that Nigerians must live with the burden of bombings until it stops.
The ACF, a northern socio-cultural group said the persistent bombings in the country particularly in the North were not beyond repairs and that Nigerians do not have to live with them.
The CPC also said the president should tender his resignation if he is unable to bring the bombings to an end.
Reacting to Jonathan’s statement yesterday, the National Publicity Secretary of the ACF, Anthony Sani, said, “I don’t think he (Jonathan) said so but what we feel is that it is not something beyond repairs, it is not something we have to live with but something we have to work hard to overcome.”
“While I agree that it is a difficult thing because confronting a group of people that believe they have nothing to gain or live for and that they have more to gain in death is not a simple thing. You know full well that it cuts across national boundaries and that is why it is so difficult to manage. The president cannot say we should live with it but that we should work very hard to overcome it.”
The national publicity secretary of ACN, Lai Mohammed has called on the president to engage Boko Haram.
Mohammed said, “It is quite unfortunate but we do not have to live with it. We must confront it.
Similarly, Yinka Odumakin, spokesman to the CPC’s presidential candidate in the last general elections, Gen Muhammadu Buhari, said yesterday that Nigerians do not want to live with the bombings as a reality of everyday life and if Jonathan cannot bring them to an end, he should tender his resignation.
Odumakin said, “Nigerians do not want to live with the bombings. They are already living with too many burdens.
“They are living with the burden of poverty, lack of power supply, the lack good leaders and the burden of bombings should not be added to their problems.
“The president should confront the issue headlong.
Why is that three months after telling us that he knew those behind Boko Haram, he is yet to expose them? He set up a probe panel to look into Boko Haram and they have submitted a report. 100 days after the report was submitted, we are yet to see the White Paper.