..Says Ndume can do better helping FG to find local solutions to B’Haram menace
Chairman of the Senate Committee on Services, Senator Sunday Karimi, has stated that over 50 percent of Nigeria’s revenue has been spent on fighting insurgency.
This was in response to his Borno South counterpart, Senator Ali Ndume, who accused President Bola Tinubu’s administration of allegedly making lopsided political appointments in favour of the Yoruba ethnic group.
He expressed surprise that Ndume, a former Chief Whip of the 10th Senate, often chose to “play to the gallery” by leaving “real development challenges like the insecurity confronting Nigeria, to promote sentiments.”
In a statement in Abuja on Tuesday, Karimi, who represents Kogi-West Senatorial District, cited the devastation caused to Nigeria’s existence by Boko Haram insurgency, saying that it cost the nation “over 50 per cent of its earnings” in recent years in counter-terrorism spending.
Karimi urged Ndume to devote more energy to assisting the government in finding what he called “local solutions” to the war against insurgency instead of “constantly projecting” himself as a critic of Tinubu’s government.
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“Over 50% of Nigeria’s earnings in the last few years is being spent on fighting insurgency.
“Rather than playing to the gallery and criticising the government, Senator Ndume as a leader of his people should go back home, liaise with his people on solving Boko Haram problems.
“Insecurity has a local solution”, he stated.
Karimi cited an example with himself, saying that to address banditry, kidnapping and other violent crimes in Kogi-West, he had facilitated the building of a military base in Egbetokun, Yagba West Local Government Area of Kogi State, in addition to the provision of other logistics.
“The country has lost a lot of his soldiers and trillions of Naira fighting insurgents in Senator Ndume’s Senatorial District in the last decades.
“In fact, I lost one of the young officers, a captain in the Nigerian Army from my Senatorial District serving in his community three weeks ago.
“Lots of young Nigerians had lost their lives fighting to defend the territorial integrity of our country. Those are more serious and compelling issues threatening our collective existence”, he added.
The Kogi-West lawmaker was reacting to the latest comments made by Ndume when he appeared as a guest on Arise TV’s ‘Prime Time’ on Monday he alleged that Tinubu had been unfair to other parts of the country in the appointments he made so far.
Section 14(3) of the Constitution, which deals with federal character, Ndume argued that so far, Tinubu had breached it in his appointments.
“Appointments, especially political appointments, should reflect the federal character, and that is not the case here”, he insisted.
He added, “I think I have a better personal relationship with most of these people, but that does not stop me from speaking the truth. I have an obligation to do that.”
Sen. Ndume went on to say that “everyone, each one of us, will stand before God and account for what he is responsible for.”
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