President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday expressed his administration’s readiness to put machinery in place to persuade the Boko Haram sect that has been unleashing violence in some parts of the country to embrace peace. Buhari made the promise while playing host to a delegation of residents of the Federal Capital Territory which included the President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki, who paid him Christmas homage in his official residence at the Presidential Villa, Abuja. The promise came less than 24 hours after the President claimed that the Federal Government has “technically won the war” against the sect.
But the President said on Friday that he would use government institutions to persuade members of the sect to allow peace to reign. He, however, did not disclose the nature which the persuasion would take and those who would be involved.
“On Boko Haram, this government is determined to make sure that we persuade them if they can be persuaded, we will use government institutions to persuade them to allow peace to reign,” he said.
The President stressed the need for all Nigerians to come together and pull the country out of the problems that it has found itself. He said while everybody in the world believes that Nigeria is a lucky country because of its natural resources, the country’s problem remains how to organise its citizens and how to get the right leadership in place.
He recalled that from the analysis of the All Progressives Congress during campaign, the party discovered that the country’s three biggest problems are security, unemployment of youths as well as bribery and corruption. He noted that while the youth make up 65 per cent of the country’s population, 65 per cent of them are unemployed.
Buhari reiterated his position that there could not be any development without security. He said:
“We appreciate that the security agencies are doing their best and their best is showing and we have to continue praying for them. There can be no development without security; we have to continue to pray for them.
“We have two million people who are Internally Displaced Persons and 70 per cent are women and 70 per cent of them are children, some of them are orphans; they grew up not knowing their parents, tradition or culture.
“As leaders, we have a weighty responsibility to ensure that infrastructure for the orphans are taken care of. As leaders, we wake with the feeling for those children; the most important thing is that they must not be denied education”.
“Schools must be rebuilt. We also thank Danjuma and the G7 led by the United States. They have been doing their best to help Nigeria train our military.”
Earlier, the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Muhammadu Bello, who led the delegation consisting of Christian and Islamic leaders told the President that they were at the Presidential Villa to wish him a merry Christmas.
Bello observed that the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ coming a day after the celebration of the birth of Prophet Muhammed was a unique message to adherents of the two religions to live in peace.