By Chuks Okocha
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) yesterday called on President Muhammadu Buhari to rejig the security network of the country.
The PDP maintained that it is a national embarrassment that a foreign military could conduct such a stink operation without the knowledge of the Nigeria Armed Forces.
The party also berated the presidency for its continued silence over the rescue of the American in the Nigerian territory without the consent and knowledge of the country’s armed forces.
It also lambasted the Chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Governor Mai Mala Buni, for purportedly politicising the President Buhari administration in ability to stem the tide of insecurity, particularly in the northern parts of the country.
The PDP also slammed APC for mismanaging the security territorial integrity of Nigeria, which it said has led as embarrassing takeover of Nigerian soil by foreign militaries.
The party in a statement issued by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, said the mere fact that the United States Blue Seal operated and rescued a kidnapped American remains an embarrassment to the national integrity of the country.
According to PDP, “If anything, the silence by the Buhari presidency on this sticking embarrassment tends to indicate its acceptance of PDP’s position that it can neither secure the territorial integrity of our nation nor arrest the wave of insecurity ravaging our country.
“Nigerians had therefore expected that instead of picking fights with well-meaning citizens, including the PDP, the APC should have taken responsibility for the failures of the Buhari presidency and urge the president to learn from Presidents Idris Derby of Chad and US President Donald Trump on how to protect and guarantee the safety of Nigerian citizens.”
PDP asserted that such a primitive disposition by the chairman of the APC that the PDP is politicising security issues in Nigeria “is a further confirmation that the APC as a party neither cares about its promises to Nigerians nor worry about the safety and well-being of our citizens.”
The opposition party urged Nigerians to recall how the APC deployed such ‘unpatriotic moves’ to politicise security issues in order to frustrate the rescue of the abducted Chibok girls in 2014, for partisan gains.
“It is indeed unpardonable that the APC, which during the 2015 election campaign, promised to promptly end insurgency, upon which it was handed the rein of power, is now shamelessly seeking to divert public attention from the worsened banditry, insurgency and unbridled ravaging of Nigerians under President Buhari’s watch.
“Is it not the worst form of leadership failure that President Buhari, am army general, who promised to lead from the front in the fight against insurgency, had rather taken a back seat in the comfort and luxury of Aso Rock Presidential Villa, leaving Nigerians at the mercy of bandits, terrorists, kidnappers, and to languish in detention camps in various parts of the country,” the party lamented.
The spokesman of PDP said that it is clear that PDP’s statement on the rescue operation on the Nigerian soil by the United States as well as similar earlier operation performed by Chad, was a patriotic call in the overall national interest.
