Peter Obi, the immediate past governor of Anambra State, has said that Nigeria under the leadership of President Muhammadu Buhari has failed as a country.
Mr. Obi made this assertion in Abakaliki, Ebonyi State on Saturday, September 30, 2017 as he gave an Independence anniversary speech as a guest speaker at the Akanu-Ibiam International Conference Centre.
The former governor spoke on the topic “Change and changing Nigeria through harnessing of investment potentials of Ebonyi state: yesterday, today and tomorrow’, in which he lamented that Nigeria is still operating in the past with no qualified leadership to revitalise the economy.
The former governor blamed the recent rise in agitation of youth across the country, especially the Indigenous People of Biafra, as a result of the poor leadership of the present administration of the federal government.
“For me the country has failed, If anybody tells you that Nigeria is doing well, tell them it is a lie. They said that we are out of recession but almost all Nigerians are still feeling greatly the impact of recession,” Obi is quoted as saying by Premium Times.
He urged the governor of Ebonyi state, David Umahi, to always tell the people he is ruling the truth adding that the people will trust and believe him the more.
The former banking executive said more Nigerians are bound agitate except the leadership challenges of the country are addressed.
Mr. Obi said the recent agitations by the Indigenous People on of Biafra, IPOB, and other groups indicate that more of such would be coming.
He said the various agitations across the country were the cumulative effect of leadership failure that has bedeviled the country since its independence.
“Whenever they talk about Nigeria at 57, I refuse to talk. My opinion is that Nigeria is a failed country, period and that is why you are seeing so many agitations you are seeing today. The agitation is not
ending, it’s just begging,” he said.
“It is a cumulative effect of leadership failure over the several years of this country and you can’t stop it because you now have millions of young people in their productive age doing nothing, you can call them anything”.
He harped on the need to create jobs for the teeming unemployed youth so as to stop them from further agitation.
“If you don’t have a job and you have not eaten food in the morning, afternoon and night, tomorrow you are a potential terrorist, quote me anywhere. The only way to stop that is to give them jobs,” he said.
“We are moving from baggage economy to knowledge economy. So, the country should stop dwelling on solid minerals because it is a baggage economy and nobody lives with it. This is what Nigeria is doing and we are still talking about oil which is already destined to finish one day,” Mr. Obi stated.
He called on the government to ensure that the Sustainable Development Goals are mainstreamed in the development agenda of the country.
“Nigeria should queue into Sustainable Development Goals (SDG), not in signature. The country is there in signature and it is the only country that got involved in Millennium Development Goal (MDG) and did not achieve one goal because as soon as we signed the signature, we threw it away and came here and started doing things wrongly.
“China put MDGs in their developmental agenda, they mainstreamed it in their developmental agenda and they are targeting to lift 16million people out of poverty but I don’t know how many people Nigeria will lift in the next 10 years because there is no such measurable goals, everything is done in confusion,” he said.
“Our reserve is weak today and we are not talking about savings rather we are borrowing more. In 2007, all our debts were written off and we didn’t owe anybody. But in 2017, we have accumulated a debt of $69 billion and nobody is thinking how do we get over this because what we are doing is based on nothing. We just borrow money and share,” Mr. Obi stated.
