APC tells PDP: Stop seeing Boko Haram as conspiracy against your government

The interim national Publicity Secretary of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Alhaji Lai Mohammed has advised the PDP-led federal government to forget the thought that Boko Haram is a grand conspiracy against it. According the him, the sooner government sees the sect as an enemy of the world, the better for national peace and stability. Speaking yesterday at the Nigerian Institute of Journalism (NIJ) students’ week in Lagos, Mohammed said APC believes that only a non-partisan approach can help the country to forge a common front against Boko Haram, “hence we offered our hand of support to the government which by the way, is yet to respond to our offer. The offer remains on the table, nonetheless. The chieftain, who on the topic ‘The Role of Opposition, Media and Youth in Sustaining Democracy’, added that “We believe the government should summon a national stakeholders’ security summit as against an all politicians’ gathering to help fashion out measures that can act as ‘quick wins’ against Boko Haram and show the world that Nigeria is united against the terrorist group. “Democracy is imperiled without a virile opposition; a robust, responsible and credible opposition is a sine qua non to an enduring democracy and a ruling party or government can only wish the opposition away at its own peril”. The APC spokesman recalled that his party had put forward a number of suggestions which PDP rejected. “We asked the government to develop a holistic counter-insurgency programme. Rather than tackling the problem piecemeal, we advised the government to align its military strategy with political and economic measures, since terrorism is hard to defeat and 1 million troops may not be able to defeat Boko Haram. “We asked the government to de-radicalise the North- east, which is worst hit by the insurgency; among other things but our suggestions were thrown into the dust bin”.