Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria, HURIWA, has described the celebration of Nigeria’s 61st Independence as a charade.
The rights advocacy group also called for immediate release of Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, and for the secessionist group to embrace genuine dialogues with the government.
The group opined that Nigeria at the moment has met all the description of a failed nation and backed its opinion with a recent by the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) and the Harvard Kennedy School which said that Nigeria as a nation is at the point of no return.
HURIWA further noted that incompetence, ineptitude, insensitive, high-handedness and nepotic leadership has thrown the country into disaster and woes.
The group said the current administration has lowered the bar of good governance and has abandoned Nigerians to the vagaries and uncertainties of conflicts entrepreneurs, arms smugglers, terrorists.
HURIWA said that the President made the mistake of a life time by surrounding himself by those it described as ethnic warlords such Garba Shehu, amongst others, accusing the presidential aide of clearly working to advance the selfish and pedestrian interests of his Fulani and Islamic groups and affiliations using Public platform and resources.
HURIWA also challenged the President to initiate concrete, genuine and deep national reconciliation and dialogue and check the rising Ethno-religious vendetta and diatribes being stoked by Garba Shehu and other ethno-religious warlords embedded in his government.
In a statement signed by the National coordinator; Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, HURIWA carpeted the nation’s political class for their alleged collective and classical lack of leadership acumen and capacity to manage the country’s diversities.
“The experience of Nigerians since 2015 has been piercing. Before then, Nigeria was the third fastest growing economy in the world next to China and India with a growth rate of close to seven per cent but the economy contracted immediately after the swearing in of President Buhari who took more than six months to constitute his cabinet and sadly the cabinet ministers are mostly opportunistic cash guzzling politicians with zero commitment to Nigeria’s national economic revolution and advancement.
“Thus, Nigeria has continued to meander the path befitting failed, weak and “juvenile” states. A state that had very great prospects.”
HURIWA averred that it was disturbing to note that while Nigeria is the third most terrorized country in the world, next to Afghanistan and Iraq, the Buhari led government actions are centered on cows in such a way that Cows are more secure in Nigeria than Nigerians just as the herders are armed to the teeth to the knowledge of Government authorities.
Also, HURIWA revealed that Nigeria’s public debt stock, which has reached $84billion with debt service costs gulping about 80 percent of entire government’s revenue, Nigeria’s external debt increased by 117.4 per cent from $12.6 billion in 2015 to $27.4 billion by the end of 2019.
Furthermore, the rights group expressed worries that between March and June 2020, a total of $10.26 billion new debt was approved by the National Assembly while other approvals for more loans were also given this 2021.
“Of the four administrations who have led Nigeria since her return to democracy in 1999, the current administration holds the worst record in terms of economic growth. Olusegun Obasanjo’s regime from 1999 to 2007 had an average growth rate of 6.9 per cent.
“His immediate successor Umaru Musa Yar’Adua did even better in his two years with an average growth rate of 7.6 per cent while Goodluck Jonathan delivered 5 per cent growth rate in his six-year term as President that ended in 2015,” the group added.
Relatedly, HURIWA also used the occasion of the 61 independence celebration of Nigeria to call for cessation of conflicts and attacks in the South East of Nigeria so dialogue can be embraced.
HURIWA further called on IPOB to strictly enforced the suspension of the Monday’s sit at home order as well as the United Nations for intervention and the release of Kanu.
