Jubiliation as ATIKU ‘ressurects’ NNAMDI AZIKIWE in Anambra, says ZIK ‘the greatest Igbo man to come out of Nigeria’
FORMER President Jonathan has again had encomium of praises heaped upon him for conceding defeat in the 2015 presidential election in Nigeria and conducting a peaceful handover to his rival and successor, President Muhammadu Buhari.
Raila Odinga former Prime Minister of Kenya, while speaking at a guest lecture the Nnamdi Azikiwe University , Awka, Anambra State said Jonathan’s concession of defeat has given credibility to electoral processes in Nigeria and Africa.
His words:
“Before then most African leaders would not concede defeat as an incumbent, the crises of nation states in Africa,” noted that the bane of the African continent were dictatorship, corruption and ethnicity.
“Ethnicity is the disease of the elite. They are the people who would always fan the embers of ethnicity and divisive tendencies whenever they lose their selfish interest,” he said.
The former Kenyan Prime Minister commended Buhari’s anti-corruption war and extended his net of praises to the late Owelle of Onitsha, Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe who he described as a foremost Pan-Africanist for his pioneering role in the liberation of the African continent.
In his remarks, the chairman of the occasion, a former Vice President of Nigeria, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, described the late Azikiwe as “the greatest Igbo man to come out of Nigeria.”
“The importance of education to modern societies and their people cannot be overemphasized. Education is too important to be left in the hands of government alone. Education should not depend solely on the ebbs and flows of government revenues.
“It is education that took me from a small village in Adamawa State to the position that I attained today and helped me to make the modest contribution that I have made so far to our country and humanity. And every Nigerian child should have similar opportunities to reach his or her full potential.
“I could not have gone to school if my parents were required to pay for it. That and the importance of education to nation building is the reason why I strongly believe that primary and secondary education should be free and compulsory in our country and indeed across Africa,” the former Vice President stated.
In his speech, the Anambra State Governor, Chief Willie Obiano, represented by his deputy, Dr. Nkem Okeke, called for creation of great institutions in the country that would have perpetual succession.
