The Minister of Information, Mr. Labaran Maku, has restated his call on some elders in the northern part of Nigeria to desist from politicising current security situation in the country.
Maku made the call on Saturday at Nyankpa at a civic reception held in his honour by the people of Nyankpa Kingdom, near Keffi, in Panda Development Area of Nasarawa state.
He said that the call on President Goodluck Jonathan not to contest the 2015 elections as a result of the security challenge in the North amounted to politicising the security situation.
He said that true sons and daughters of the north should be concerned about finding solutions to the problem rather than seeking who to blame for it.
“What is expected of all true sons of the north is cooperation with government to end the bloodshed.
“What we have seen in the country in the past three years is a deliberate attempt by a few individuals to undermine the efforts of the Federal Government.
“It is obvious that the aim of these people is to use the present challenges in the north to blackmail the president into dropping his ambition of contesting in 2015.
“They are now using the security situation to campaign for 2015 and this is bad and should stop,’’ he said.
Maku said that Jonathan had done for the north what some previous presidents of northern extraction did not do for the region since independence.
He said that the evidence of Jonathan’s efforts to transform the north and restore its lost glory were overwhelming and could not be covered by any form of political manoeuvres.
According to him, the railway projects that run from the north to the south, the various road projects, agricultural projects, water and power projects, are some of Jonathan’s legacies for the north.
Maku said that the civic reception had made it evident that the call on the president by the selected group of northern elders was not genuine and did not reflect the wishes of all northern people.
He said that the north was behind the president, adding that he would win more votes in the region than he did in 2011.
The minister, however, called on the people of Nyankpa kingdom and Nasarawa state to embrace peace and remain united in the interest of the state’s development.
He said that no meaningful development would take place in the area if chaos and crises persisted and urged them to support government programmes and policies.
He also spared time to sensitise the people on the need to maintain environmental and personal hygiene to avoid contracting the deadly Ebola virus.
The minister said though no case of infection had been reported in any state outside Lagos, it was important for the people to be aware and vigilant, particularly on preventive measures.
Earlier, the Paramount Ruler of Nyankpa kingdom, Joel Aninge, commended the Federal Government for restoring peace in parts of the country where there had been crises.
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