Adopt Yar’adua’s template in tackling insecurity, Atiku advises Buhari

Tunde Opalana, Abuja

The Buhari administration has been advised to adopt the template and emulate the leadership qualities of late President Umaru Musa Yar’adua, in solving growing insecurity challenges in various parts of the country.

Remembering the late Yar’adua who died in office on May 5, 2010, the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, said Nigeria needs the vision such as that of Yar’adua in this trying period when insecurity occasioned by violent killings, armed banditry, kidnapping, terrorism, cattle rustling, religious and communal strives pervade almost all geopolitical zones of the country.

Atiku called on the federal government to adopt strategies employed by late president to stem the economy wrecking unrest in the Niger Delta region, declaring that “in this period where Nigeria is facing almost unprecedented violence and insecurity,

the world will remember that it was President Yar’adua, who bequeathed peace to the Niger Delta through his futuristic and visionary amnesty and rehabilitation programme.

“That single action saw an unprecedented improvement in the performance of Nigeria’s oil and gas industry which led to record-breaking 5 per cent Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth.

“Beyond that, Umaru Musa Yar’adua was an advocate and proponent of the rule of law and the doctrine of separation of powers. His was the only administration that did not suffer from executive-legislative tensions in this Fourth Republic.

“Nigeria lost a man of peace and a leader with a vision in the person of President Umaru Musa Yar’adua.”

Speaking about his close association with the late president in a statement he personally signed, the former Vice President said that “Yar’adua was a man I was closely connected to.

First, because his late brother, the great Tafida of Katsina, Shehu Musa Yar’Adua, was my political mentor who taught both myself and Umaru, the ropes in politics.

“Obviously, with Umaru, the apple did not fall far from the tree. And secondly, because we worked very, very closely when he was the Governor of Katsina state at the time I was Vice President to our leader, President Olusegun Obasanjo.”

Atiku said he was proud of what the former president achieved and the fact that such a decent leader was produced by his political family (the Yar’adua political family and the Peoples Democratic Party).

“May the Almighty Allah continue to shine His Noor (light) on the face of our late dear President, Umaru Yar’Adua as we mark nine years of his passing and may Allah (SWT) grant him al-Jannah Firdaus.

“I also pray that God continues to bless the family he left behind. A grateful nation appreciates the labours of their beloved son almost a decade after his passing,” he stated.