The Federal Republic of Nigeria has been described as a “desolate” country.
The comment was made by the national leader of the Action Congress of Nigeria and former governor of Lagos State, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
Tinubu who spoke on Monday through his representative, the Osun State Governor, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola during the Law Week organised by the Ikeja Branch of the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, lamented the economic and security situation in Nigeria.
In his keynote address delivered at the event, Tinubu stated: “We have entered the place of our desolation. Contrary to GDP figures, the economy is entwined in a long-term courtship with mal-investment and underdevelopment. Poverty consumes the social fabric, as most people continue to live under its shadow.”
Continuing, the ACN chieftain noted that, “Insecurity abounds and safety is found only in the choice spaces reserved for the few and the privileged. Rancour sings its song as if it has become the national anthem. Region is pitted against region, religion against religion, party against party, brother against brother. Never have I heard so much reckless talk of separation and disunion as now. If it is said we are moving, we must admit much of the motion is backward.”
Tinubu said the only way the country could make progress was by establishing true federalism “so, the national government is no longer yet petty Cyclops terrorising those smaller than it.”
The ACN leader who maintained that the “federal government’s mission is not to dictate what our lives will be,” stressed that, “Its role is to create an environment where the various constituent parts-states, local government areas, and the private sector, can get on with the job of defining and developing themselves as they deem fit.”
The former Lagos helmsman said the reason where there is so much corruption was because power was too centralised in the country.
“Senior officials and their allies seize complete and personal control of the limited fertile areas of a generally sterile economy. They perpetuate a covert eminent domain by virtue of enormous powers of their offices. They do so in the belief that the general public will be indifferent to this subterranean confiscation of what should be the wealth we share in common,” Tinubu said.
Other speakers at the event who also called for true federalism included – Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, General Alabi Isama (Rtd), Mr. Roland Otaru, SAN, among others.