Insecurity: Return home and face your challenges, PDP tells Buhari

…Berates President for abandoning responsibility to Nigerians

….Says Buhari’s inattention has emboldened insurgents, bandits to continue to over-run communities

Tunde Opalana, Abuja

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has charged President Muhammadu Buhari to as a matter of urgency end his ‘private visit’ abroad and immediately return home to face the deteriorated security situation in the country.

Berating Buhari for abdicating duties, the party described as completely unacceptable for the President to practically abandon his responsibilities, as the Commander-In-Chief, to pursue unexplained private matters in foreign lands, while bandits, marauders and insurgents seized the nation; maiming, kidnapping and killing citizens with reckless abandon.

The party said it is factual that President Buhari has completely failed the nation and that his dereliction to duty is a clear signal that he has been practically overwhelmed, deflated and has nothing to offer.

It said President Buhari has not demonstrated required capacity to control the security situation in the country but now resorts to cheap escapism, particularly in the face of allegations in the public space that certain individuals around his administration are benefitting from the situation.

The PDP insisted that President Buhari’s inattention has emboldened insurgents and bandits to continue to over-run communities, unleash mayhem and bloodletting on citizens in Borno, Zamfara, Yobe, Adamawa, Gombe, Taraba, Kaduna, Benue, Kogi and other states of the federation, including Mr. President’s home state, Katsina.

The party in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan, expressed unease and palpable fear foisted on the nation by spate of growing insecurity.

The party said “while President Buhari wanders abroad, bandits are having a field day, pillaging communities in Katsina State; killing several persons and abducting the District Head of his hometown, Daura, Musa Umar; the father in-law of Mr. President’s security aide.

“Within this period, marauders invaded communities in Adamawa and killed no fewer than 26 innocent Nigerians; many more have been killed in Borno, Taraba, Benue and Zamfara states, where bandits also reportedly attacked Government Girls Secondary School Moriki, and kidnapped some school girls.

“While the Buhari administration remains virtually nonchalant, kidnappers have taken over many of our major highways, with hundreds of compatriots held in captivity in forests along Kaduna-Abuja, Taraba-Katsina-Ala and other highways in the country.

“This is in addition to allegations that some of the bandits arrested, in states such as Katsina, are not Nigerians but aliens allegedly imported by the All Progressives Congress (APC) from Niger Republic to assist it in unleashing violence and rigging the 2019 general elections”.

The party also asserted that the situation in Nigeria today signposts the terrible condition the nation will face if Buhari’s mandate is not retrieved at the tribunal to enable competent and uncompromised hands to run the affairs of the country.

The PDP, therefore, called on President Buhari to immediately return home and use the remaining part of his tenure to seek help instead of wandering abroad under the guise of private visits.