June 11, (THEWILL)- President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday said those financing all acts of terrorism in the country will be dealt with.
Buhari spoke on Friday while responding to questions during an exclusive interview with the NTA, monitored by THEWILL
He said those sponsoring terrorism in the country are people who have been made irrelevant and are only trying to register their presence through violence.
“Their motive is that, since they have been made irrelevant, they want to use the resources they have accumulated over the years to prove that they are still around. The administration will deal with them, anybody caught will be dealt with,” he added.
The President however, said the delay in the delivery of aircraft, tanks and other military hardware ordered from foreign countries by the Federal Government, was hampering his administration’s efforts to address insecurity and insurgency.
Also confronted with accusation that he has been lenient with bandits and terrorists in the North while he handed down the stern warning to hoodlums in the South, President Buhari said his critics were being unfair to him.
While describing the accusation as unfair, the President said he was also treating bandits and insurgents in the “language they understand.”
He said, “They are being unfair, they should go and ask the governors of Sokoto, Zamfara, Katsina and find out how I have been deploying the police and the military to deal with the bandits, we are not sparing anybody but Nigeria is vast and there are a lot of forests.”
Buhari had courted controversy recently when he said those supporting insurrection and violence in the country would be shocked.
The President had condemned the attacks on police stations, prisons and offices of the Independent National Electoral Commission, especially in the South-East, warning that, “Many of those misbehaving today are too young to be aware of the destruction and loss of lives that occurred during the Nigerian Civil War. Those of us in the fields for 30 months, who went through the war, will treat them in the language they understand.”
Buhari’s statement, which was also tweeted, sparked outrage on social media, with some Nigerians criticising the President for being insensitive to evoke the wounds of the civil war.
Twitter later pulled down the President’s tweet and the Federal Government subsequently suspended the micro-blogging platform.
However, when asked to explain what he meant by treating insurrectionist in the language they understand and if he was going to react in a “fire for fire” way? Buhari said, “More than that, we will arrest them, try them and give them very big publicity and then jail them so that people will know that when they misbehave they will not get away with it.”
Also asked to explain what he meant by his tweet which was tagged genocidal on Twitter, he said “What I mean is how can you go to a police station, kill the police people who are there, loot the armoury and burn the place? What do you want to achieve?
“Go and open prison and allow criminals who have been tried by the legal system and let them escape and how can government sit aside and allow this confusion to be perpetrated?
“All they need is confusion and no government can allow confusion.
“Look at the EndSARS incident. The previous Governor of Lagos State bought 200 buses to complement the transportation in Lagos and he built a complex, involving railways, but they went and burnt them.
“The present Governor made an album and came to see me I said ‘thank you very much.’ I took the album, put it in my archive, and told him to tell Lagosians to work because we don’t have the money after the government bought 200 buses for some people to come and burn it. So, let them work.”
He stressed that the people who misbehaved during the EndSARS protests will not get away with it.
He further warned the youths of the cost of insecurity by depriving investors from coming into the country.
He said if the youths continue to promote insecurity, there will be no jobs from foreign investment.
He explained: “As I said, the number one thing is security. If you don’t secure the country, people will not invest.
‘That was why those who organised the EndSARS. I sent all the Ministers back to their constituencies.
“Constitutionally, the ministers represent their states.
“So I asked them to go to their states. Let them speak to their Governors, their political leaders, traditional rulers, and very importantly, let them speak to the youths that the Federal Government says there is no more vacancy, virtually every department is filled: The same thing in the states and local governments.
“So you can have a good degree from a good university and you will never get a job because if you promote Insecurity by burning factories, institutions nobody will come and invest.
“So it’s in their own interests that Nigeria is secure. When the country is secure it’s potentially rich because God has endowed Nigeria with resources.
“People will come and invest. Countries that have something to invest must make sure that they can recover their investments.”
On those critical of his achievements, the President pleaded that their criticisms should be fair enough to judge him objectively, adding that those observing the work done so far by his administration, will know that there had been improvements in roads, rails, power and so on since he assumed power in 2015.
He said that time was needed for the efforts put in place by his administration to secure the country to start yielding visible results.
Buhari, however declared that he was not satisfied with the performance of the nation’s economy.
He said the low performance of the economy has been a thing of concern to him adding his administration was doing everything possible to improve the economy.
According to him, one of the steps taken so far is reaching out to the international community to allow their multinational firms to come to Nigeria and establish their presence by employing Nigerians through which the economy will pick up.
“No, I am not. That is why I am trying harder to make the people more accountable. That is why we are persuading foreign countries to allow their multinationals to develop more confidence in Nigeria and come and invest,” Buhari said.
When asked about the anti-graft fight of his government, Buhari said his administration has done relatively well in bringing corrupt politicians to book.
He said, “Nigerians, I think, are very forgetful. I am very pleased that the majority of Nigerians think that this administration, under the circumstance, are (sic) doing their (sic) best but people who misappropriated funds are elected members either at state or federal level…
“You can accuse them or try to prove that when they were elected members of the House of Reps and they are given ministries and so on, they had only one house and maybe a wife but now they have several houses may be in Abuja, maybe in Lagos, so, rarely, if you try to work out their legitimacy limit, viz-a-viz their expenditure, they will be exposed.”
The President stressed the need for the establishment of special courts to try corruption cases in Nigeria.
He said it was high time special courts were established in the country especially to try several corruption cases currently in conventional courts.
His words: “You have instances of cases lasting for as long as 10 years before they are determined and in some cases judges handling the cases may die. But if there are special courts, there will be a time frame to conclude the corruption cases and not dragging on unnecessarily”.
On the future of the All Progressives Congress (APC), President Buhari said that the APC will do everything possible to remain in power for a long time.
He said everything possible is being done to make the party formidable. “We are doing all we can to make the APC be in power for as long as possible.
“That is why we carried out the revalidation exercise from state to state; local government to local government and ward by ward.”
The President also vowed not to stay in office a day longer than expected. He promised to abide by the Constitution and the oath he took when he was being sworn in.
The President expressed the desire to hand over a more prosperous country to his successor in 2023.
