Time For Nigeria To Be Great Once Again
I
want to take this last opportunity, before we go to the polls on
Saturday March 28 and April 11 respectively, to thank everyone who has
supported our campaigns. I am humbled and grateful to have had the
opportunity to meet so many of my fellow Nigerians who have helped to
carry the message of change across our great country.
This is
the fourth time that I would be standing for election as the President
of Nigeria. All these years, I have been driven by a keen awareness of
the potential greatness of our country and the desire to provide the
true leadership that will unleash this huge potential.
I
believe that a stable and prosperous Nigeria is not only important to
Nigerians. It is also important to Africa and the rest of the world. The
evidence of this is the unprecedented attention that our country will
receive this weekend. On Saturday, the whole world would wait with
baited breath for the greatest black nation on earth to take charge of
its destiny. We must therefore not miss the significance of this moment.
We must not let ourselves and our country down.
At no other
time in our history is Nigeria in such an urgent need of strong and
competent leadership. Sadly, at no other time is this leadership so
sorely absent in our country. We live in a time of great opportunities
and great peril. It is only a leader that understands these in equal
measure that can find the rightful place for Nigeria among the great
Nations of the world.
I have travelled extensively around
Nigeria in the last three months. In the course of my travels, I
encountered directly, what I have always believed: that a Hausa man’s
desire for security is not different from the Ijaw woman’s desire to
feel secured in any part of our country.
An Igbo woman’s desire
for her children to get quality education and find employment is not
different from the Yoruba man’s dream for his children to become a
useful member of our society. A wife’s desperate need for affordable and
quality healthcare for her husband diagnosed with prostate cancer in
Enugu is not different from a husband’s desire to save the life of his
wife diagnosed with ovarian cancer in Lagos.
Invariably, our
fears are the same; our dreams are the same; and our problems are the
same. Regardless of the language we speak, or the way we understand and
worship God, what affects anyone of us, affects everyone of us.
Our
economy is celebrated as the largest in Africa, yet our country is home
to the continent’s highest number of people living in extreme poverty.
Our youth population is larger than the combined population of many of
our neighbours, yet our failure to plan and create opportunities for
them is turning them to a social time bomb rather than economic
catalysts.
A band of ragtag terrorist group has threatened our
territorial integrity, killed thousands of Nigerians, displaced our
people and abducted our children. The almost 60, 000 Nigerians who have
become refugees in neighbouring countries represent a budding threat to
sub-regional stability.
However, even in the face of these
daunting challenges, I see a great opportunity for change. We have to
start by rebuilding the trust and confidence of Nigerians in their
government. No citizen will respect a government under whose watch more
than 200 girls were abducted.
This singular act can only portray
the government as insensitive, incompetent or both. When I become
president, reuniting these children with their families will, without
doubts, be a top priority. Rebuilding the army and other security
agencies will also be a top priority of my government. I will ensure
that never again will terrorists find a safe haven in Nigeria.
Recent
fall in international price of crude leaves us badly exposed and
vulnerable. Dwindling oil revenue also means that we are going to face
serious financial challenges in the months ahead. However, even as
daunting as this appears, it also provides us with great opportunity to
diversify our economy and finally give meaning to the widely held belief
that our prosperity as a nation would not continue to depend on the
resources buried under our feet, but on the productive capacity of our
people.
No matter how much resources we have, if not properly
utilized, it would only create a few billionaires and leave majority of
our people in poverty. Under the current administration, corruption has
enjoyed unprecedented prosperity and this has been at the heart of most
of our government failings, including insecurity, broken infrastructure
and growing inequality in our country.
My government will have a
zero tolerance for corruption. I will set a personal example and run a
government that truly serves the people rather than serve themselves and
a privileged few. Like I have repeatedly maintained that if Nigeria
does not kill corruption, corruption will kill Nigeria.
We must
not allow Nigeria to die. Therefore, we must do all that is necessary to
root out this evil that has reduced our great country to a laughing
stock of the world. We must begin to rebuild the social fabrics of our
society and teach a different experience to our youth in the values of
hard work, discipline, integrity and service.
The change that I
seek therefore; is a change from the current regime of mindless of
corruption and profligacy; a change from fear and insecurity to peace
and stability; a change from religious and ethnic divisiveness to unity,
equity and justice. This is the change that my party stands for. This
is the change that I am committed to bringing about as President. Give
me the chance to lead you in rebuilding a Nigeria that all of us can be
proud of once again.
As we come out to vote on Saturday, I
appeal to all Nigerians to shun violence in whatever form. It is the
right of every adult Nigerian to vote and expect that their votes would
count in a free, fair and credible election. However, we also have a
responsibility to respect the choice of others and grant them the same
treatment that we expect.
I also want to call on all our men and
women in uniform, the Judiciary, and all others who have constitutional
responsibility to safeguard our democracy, to remember that their
responsibility is primarily to Nigerians and the survival of Nigeria.
They must therefore not allow anyone to use them to subvert the will of
the Nigerian people. I believe that their dreams and aspirations are not
different from those of other Nigerians.
I have no doubt that with God being on our side; together we can make our country great once again.
Gen. Muhammadu BUHARI, GCFR
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