There is nothing that is currently happening in Nigeria including Boko Haram and IPOB that is extraordinary.
There was a time IRA gave British government headache. They killed security men and civilians and planted bombs even in London Stock exchange. Basque separatists group gave the Spanish government tough time. Tamil Tigers terrorized some parts of Sri Lanka. UNITA rebels led by Jonas Savimbi waged guerilla war in Angola which lasted for many years. Pakistan had conflict with terrorist along its Afghanistan border.
While all these were going on no one called UK, Spain or Sri Lanka insecure and that is why I have maintained with hard unadulterated facts that Nigeria is currently not insecure. What’s going on is “insecurity propaganda”.
Even in China, there was a time they were hungry, poor and dirty and butts of joke across the world.
The common thread is that these countries overcame. Nigeria will surely overcome and we are on the right path to overcoming. Dangote Refinery will soon come on stream. Work on the over $1billion contract for reviving Port Harcourt refinery has started. Abdul Samad Rabiu (BUA) will soon start building a refinery in Akwa Ibom and that’s in petroleum refining alone and the total combined investments in the refining sector will be worth about $15billion.
The significant thing about the petroleum refining investment worth over $12 billion is that they are not done by foreign entities but by local Nigerian businessman who made and are still making their money doing business in Nigeria, and by the Nigerian government.
At the moment, some people with vested interests dont want to see any good thing that is happening in Nigeria. What is going on is that displaced corrupt politicians and businessmen including drug pushers are daily dishing out propaganda in the media just to discredit the country and an administration that has done so well to drive progress in the country with just 33% of the resources its predecessors got (but did not build roads, bridges, airports, rail lines or embark on massive social welfare programs).
Against the backdrop of a global pandemic that has so far killed about 591,062 in US; 218,945 in India; 127,583 in UK; 121,177 in Italy; 104,819 in France etc; instead of gratitude to God for sparing Nigeria where only 2,063 have died from covid-19, what our elites (political, business and religious) do everyday is to go to the media and push out propaganda against the government because they lost out on power and contracts.
Just like all the propaganda and lies they have been dishing out against PMB that the country has failed so far, their latest “insecurity propaganda” will blow up in their faces.
*Mfon, a management consultant, lives in Abuja.
