Nigeria: Governors declare unanimous support for national unity

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Nigeria: Governors declare unanimous support for national unity

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A number of state governors collectively reached a consensus on keeping the nation united in the face of variant dissemination of hate messages capable of rifting the country apart. The governors maintained that the warmongers are only whiling away their time.The governors’ decision was made at a meeting with Acting President Yemi Osinbajo at the Aso Rock Villa Abuja, where an ongoing deliberation on how to check frequent agitations has been for a while.Oyo State Governor, Abiola, Ajimobi, who was the spokesman of the governors, stated that the nation’s unity must be maintained regardless of the tensions.Acting President Yemi Osinbajo, who spoke at the end of the meeting corroborated the governors’ stand that those behind the breakup call are only wasting their time.He said: “The message is for Nigerians to work more together and collaborate. We have more to gain when we are united.“We cannot afford to break, and anybody that is thinking of that, is wasting his time, and we will not allow it, not in this country. All of us are unanimous about that.”Osinbajo was convinced that the country’s unity “is sacrosanct, non-negotiable and we have all agreed to work together to educate people.”Besides, Gov Ajimobi also said “Any time you have agitation, usually, there will be poverty; there will be unemployment; there will be hardship. So, we should address fundamentally these areas of poverty, unemployment and hardship.“Nigerians are by nature a united people; nobody cares whether you are from the north, south or the east.”A recall was made by him on the effects of war in countries like Somalia and Rwanda, which have already been ravaged by prolonged war.The acting president further enjoined the governors to always stand up with one voice against persons and groups sponsoring inciting messages.The meeting which was held at the old Banquet Hall of the Presidential Villa later assumed a close-door session, but beforehand, Prof Osinbajo made his position known.Hear him: “We must not allow the careless use of words, careless expressions that may degenerate into crisis.“We are a people that like to talk and we express ourselves loudly but it is expected for us to recognise that it is those same words that can cause conflagration; that can unfortunately lead to calamity. We must be careful on how we express ourselves.“What we have seen in recent times is that some of the languages (words) used have tended to degenerate badly and I think that we must begin to speak up against some of these things and ensure that we protect our democracy and our nation from the hands of rhetoric that may just divide us.At an earlier meeting, Osinbajo dialogued with traditional leaders from both the north and south east and they all voted their support for Nigeria’s unity, which according to them, must not be toiled with.The acting president was comfortable that most of the issues discussed got the approval of the leaders, who also changed earlier positions held.The meeting also yielded agreement on punishing the conveyors of inciting messages in accordance to legal provision.However, the acting president offered the need to provide job opportunities for the youth and create an enabling environment for more economic fortunes.Osinbajo further said: “More importantly, we agreed on the need for leaders to speak out forcefully to counter divisive speech or any kind of warmongering.“We agreed that leaders, at all levels, must speak out forcefully against any kind of divisiveness or divisive speech. And we expect that our political leaders will do so without waiting to be prompted.“All of those who spoke felt that sometimes when leaders do not speak up promptly, it always results in degeneration, no matter what the problem may be.“This applied to both the statements made by the young people in the South-East as well as the youth in the northern states. We discovered there was a need for much greater resonance in the way that these things are done and for the leaders to speak up more forcefully.“We believe that if the leaders do not speak up forcefully enough, if for any reason, matters are allowed to degenerate, not only does leadership lose their legitimacy, they run the risk of things going completely out of  control.”

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