A former Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity in the Office of the Vice President during the Muhammadu Buhari administration, Laolu Akande, has faulted President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for travelling to the United Kingdom without visiting Borno State following the attack by terrorists.
Akande made his position known on a programme he hosts on Channels Television: “Inside Sources with Laolu Akande.”
He said: “Even if President Bola Ahmed Tinubu couldn’t reschedule his date with the British Royals at a time terrorists were killing Nigerians, attacking our soldiers and suicide bombers resurgent terror in Borno, could he not have done something that would represent a form of reassurance to the people of Borno and the entire Nigerians before he jetted out from Abuja to London on Tuesday?
“It’s just a question.
“What could be the options?
“Number one, couldn’t he have done a quick stopover in Maiduguri before going to London on the same day that he left?
“Or, at the barest minimum, the President could have left his voice in a direct personal message to the Nigerian people that can be broadcast showing him his body language sympathising with the pain and destruction that we have seen, including the one that we saw an ad of in Maiduguri on Monday, just a few days ago.
“But this is not to say the President utterly ignored the situation.
“That’s not what I’m saying.
“Because indeed he directed the military high command to relocate to Borno, which they have done quite promptly.
“However, this is my point, and it’s a general one: We seem to have become desensitised and we are denying aspects of our common humanity.
“It seems we are getting used to the recurrent series of death and destruction from terrorists, from bandits, and various forms of extreme violence.
“Many of our people are suffering in various parts of the country.
“It’s like we have been desensitised, and the world is watching us as we are watching ourselves.
“The sad truth is that with all the glamour and the glitz that we have seen these couple of days in London, the global audience and the local audience is also being reminded of the horror, of the terror confronting Nigerians and the Nigerian government here in Abuja.
“And people of goodwill and those who put more value on human life around the world, they must be wondering how our leaders, that is Nigerian leaders, managed to brand themselves and brand the country on a global scene, choosing to wine and dine in London while their own people, the reason they are entrusted with power, are suffering under oral pain and the angst of unrelenting terrorism.
“We are watching ourselves and the world is watching us.
“We are causing the people of the world and people of our own nation to wonder, what kind of people are we?
“What has happened to us?
“Look at the excesses of this UK for instance.
“Several state governors, tons of ministers and aides accompanied the President and the First Lady, when clearly not all of them have definite roles to play in the state visits, besides just showing up and joining in the alluring aroma as if the whole thing is a shindig.”
