No Reasons To Celebrate 54th Independence Day – Tinubu

Ex Lagos State governor Asiwaju Bola Tinubu explains why he does not feel optimistic about celebrating Nigeria’s 54th Independence in an elaborate fashion.

Nigerians suffer from poor leadership, while the nation is yet to fulfill its potential, P.M. News reports with reference to Tinubu’s statement released today, September 29.

The All Progressives Congress (APC) national leader started his address with the following words:

“We commemorate this Independence Day because the nation has survived despite its many challenges. We dare not celebrate because the nation has not flourished as it should. 54 years our national trek began with hope and promise, peace and unity.

Today, the nation staggers beneath the weight of trouble stacked upon problem multiplied by hardship. Peace and unity seem to have yielded the moment to violence and discord. We exist as a political unit on a map but we do not prosper as brothers and sisters in one nation, under one flag and pursuant to one accord.”

Insisting that he is proud to be a Nigerian, Tinubu noted however that “genuine patriotism should not induce blindness”and urged Nigerians to focus on the problems that remain unresolved.

Speaking about the upcoming celebrations of the October 1 Independence Day, the former governor said:

This is not a time for fake cheers and elation at the present state of things just because the calendar has touch this day. We need to use this hour soberly by taking stock of the obstacles mounting before us and of the hard direction in which we seem to be heading. I fear this direction, if further taken, will lead us not home but to an appointment with failure and national destitution. 

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He also expressed his opinion on the dynamics of changes in the country and criticized the acting administration over hindering the country progress because of the adopted direction.

“Nigeria currently is saddled with the reprobate leadership Awo, Zik, Sardauna and Tafawa Belewa feared. We have entered unchartered territory not so much because we are expanding the outer bounds of national progress. We traverse such ground because this government leads us into places where angles fear to tread and where sensible man should not go.

“Never has an elected government in Nigeria employed religion as a tool to divide the people, setting Nigerian brother against brother in a manner that allows this administration to function at the basest level of governance while seeking to establish a political domination that seeks no greater purpose than its self perpetuation. Our nation was supposed to advance, year by year, toward greater democracy. Instead, we rush into the pit of arbitrary, imperious rule that smacks of despotism.”

Tinubu also enumerated Nigeria’s problems and challenges concluding that those were not reasons for celebration, but the “troubling signals” that should awake the nation.

“The incessant attempts to stigmatize and physically intimidate a peaceful political opposition and the militarization of elections are features of a perverse democracy, a democracy run at gun-point and with a swift and eager trigger, Brazen assaults on the judiciary, the flippant and frequent violation of the constitution and the rule of law, and the elevation of corruption to making it a new and perhaps the strongest arm of government are the instruments that now shape our nation. These things are not the fare of celebration. They are the impetus for political reform and change.”

In his statement Tinubu said the 16 years of ruling by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) pulled the country back adding that “the longer they rule, the less benefit the people derive”.

He lamented over the politics which causes division of people saying that the flourishing can be reached only through unity.

“It is accomplished by honoring the principles of democratic good governance and economic justice. It is done by persuading the people they are better off as one instead of better off tearing at each other’s throats.”

“Governance is about trust. And this government is not even trusted by itself. That is why it does nothing except feed itself. This is not the road for a better Nigeria. We must proceed from this 54th anniversary to embark on a common sense revolution that brings about progressive change for the benefit of most of our country men and women, our youth and the vulnerable among us.”

Thus, the speaker concluded with the idea that if Nigerians want to make a step forward, they should be ready for a change in order to celebrate the “Independence Day we can and should celebrate.”