Governor Godwin Obaseki of Edo State, on Tuesday, took another swipe at the ruling All Progressive Congress,(APC) blaming the rising insecurity in the country on the party’s mismanagement of the nation’s economy.
Obaseki who spoke while receiving the leadership of the South-South Zonal Working Committee of the Peoples Democratic Party, (PDP) led by its National Vice Chairman, Chief Dan Orbih, maintained the “lawlessness and indiscipline” of the APC had brought the nation to her knees security wise.
“The way the ruling party has managed and mismanaged the economy of this country is the reason why we are having the level of insecurity that we are faced with today. The lawlessness, indiscipline by the ruling party has brought us to where we are,” he maintained.
According to him, “The challenges of insecurity just show the dysfunctionality of our federal system. We should not lose hope in Nigeria but focus on how to create confidence to give our people hope by managing the country well.”
The governor, who had three weeks ago stirred up a hornet’s nest, when he informed a bewildered nation that the APC-led Federal Government printed over N60 billion to shore up the March 2021 allocations, urged Nigerians not to lose hope in the country amid the challenges facing the country, but work collectively to ensure a better Nigeria.
Taking a jab at the lopsided Federation, Obaseki queried why security should be on the exclusive legislative list to the detriment of the remaining two tears of government.
“We run a Federation; we have three tiers of government: Federal, State and Local Governments. Why should security be exclusive to the federal level? What happened to the other two? Until we address that structural imbalance, we are not going to be able to deal with security at its core,” he posited.
To get out of the current appalling security challenges, the Edo State governor submitted that only the opposition PDP had the capacity to rescue the nation, just as he called on the South-South geo-political zone to rise up and defend itself in every way.
“The country has a major problem and it’s only the PDP that can help the President solve the problem but not his party. Let us as party men and Nigerians help rescue the nation and call on those that have the capacity to rescue Nigeria. Security is local and we can rescue this nation; that is why Edo is relatively peaceful,” Obaseki submitted.
“In the South-South, we must stand up to defend ourselves economically, politically and security wise. We have pretenders in the region who try to exploit the region and we must stop them.
“When you concentrate resources at the centre, you can’t get results. The security structure that we have in Nigeria has expired; we need a new security arrangement. The system that we operated till now is not tenable,” he noted.
Speaking earlier, Orbih noted that “The South-West and South-East have both formed a security network to protect its people. As South-South, we need to look for a way to check insecurity and protect our people in the region.”
The PDP National Vice Chairman, South-South appealed to Governor Obaseki “to lead the stand for state policing. It’s time to rejig the security architecture of Nigeria. We urge you to lend your voice to the struggle to make the country safe for all.”
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