The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, has hit the Northern Elders Forum for asking President Muhammadu Buhari , to resign over his handling of insecurity challenges bedeviling the country.
The NEF on Tuesday had in a statement by its spokesperson Hakeem Baba-Ahmed, expressed worries that Buhari’s administration does not appear to have answers to the security challenges facing the country.
The Forum said Nigerians cannot continue to live at the mercy of terrorists, particularly in the North-West.
It stressed that the Nigerian Constitution allows the president to step down if he can’t solve the challenges confronting the country.
In a statement posted on his Facebook page reacting to the call for Buhari’s resignation, Adesina lambasted the NEF, referring to the group as “Generals without troops”.
According to him, NEF is a gathering of angry and self seeking individuals that have made unsuccessful attempts to serve under his boss.
The statement said, “The Forum is largely made of angry, bitter, self-seeking individuals, who had thought they would be leading President Buhari by the nose when he emerged in 2015. In fact, key personalities in the group made strenuous efforts to be part of the administration. When they didn’t succeed, they became adversaries.
“It is on record that NEF had always opposed the Buhari administration since its gambit failed, and before the 2019 presidential election, it openly endorsed Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as next President. And that completely vitiates whatever position the Forum adopts today. It is partisan, bilious, by no means neutral. It is from a self-serving standpoint.”
Furthermore, the presidential aide argued that there were issues of insecurity globally and that the President was sparing no effort in securing Nigeria and Nigerians.
Noting that insecurity was not only obtainable in Nigeria, Adesina said the United States of America (USA) has its fair share of killings, especially under the Joe Biden administration, with no one calling for his resignation.
“Between 2009 and 2022, there were at least 271 mass shootings in United States of America, resulting in 1,518 people killed, and 980 wounded. Just this week, there has been the Brooklyn Subway Shooting, in which at least 23 people were critically injured.
“with all these, did you hear calls for the resignation of any American President? It is on record that last year was the deadliest in a decade, in terms of mass shootings. Have you heard of calls for the resignation of President Joe Biden by a caterwauling band? No.”
“Every life is important. No single life should be taken wantonly. Not in America, Europe, Asia, Africa, and definitely not in Nigeria. And when challenges occur, as we currently have, it should not be turned to a leaky political umbrella, from under which you hide to express hatred and malice.
“That is what is happening in Nigeria today. Individuals, groups, organizations, political parties, who had been against President Muhammadu Buhari, and who had been given bloody noses at the polls, are now using the smokescreen of insecurity to vent their spleen.
“We failed to oust him through the ballot box, let’s run him out of town by another means. Let’s instigate the country against him. But majority of Nigerians know better.”