Debates on Nigeria’s division are futile – Buhari

…Urges elite, leaders to sacrifice for nation’s unity

By Lawrence Olaoye

President Muhammadu Buhari has advised against dissipating energies on debates bordering on the division of the country maintaining that Nigeria was destined to be united.
The President, who was represented by his Vice, Yemi Osinbajo, gave the advice in his comments at a lunch organised by the Presidency to commemorate the 2017 Eid-Adha (Sallah) for some dignitaries yesterday at the Presidential Villa.
He also called on elites, religious and political leaders to be willing to make sacrifice for the unity and survival of the country.
He said “Our energies and resources shouldn’t be spent again on debate about division. Our manifest destiny is to be a great nation, not to be a nation where we are talking about division. We must focus our time, our energies and our resources on being that great nation that God has called us to be.
“I think we have started building that country already.
“Despite all the noise that we hear, all that noise is part of the building. Everybody knows that you cannot have birth without noise. No woman delivers a baby without some noise and without some pains.
“What we are hearing today are the noises and the pains of that great nation that God is about to give birth to.”
Osinbajo said Buhari was unavoidably absent at the lunch “because he is celebrating Sallah at home in Daura. He has not been in Daura for over a year now. So, this is an important home going for him.”
He continued “The significance of this celebration is the willingness of Abraham to make the great sacrifice of possibly the dearest thing to him, his son Isaac.
“Obviously, anyone who knows anything at all about the kinds of things that it is a willingness to make a great sacrifice. And Abraham was able to make that sacrifice. And he made it in order to be able to fulfill his own destiny and the destiny of his people.
“The message today is that our nation’s elite, Muslims, Christians and all ethnicities must recognize that we also must make sacrifices, the sacrifices that are necessary to attain the destiny that God has brought unto our people.
“I am one of those who is extremely confident that our nation will remain united.
“Because I am convinced that God’s plans and purpose for Nigeria is that we would be the preeminent black nation in the world.
“This is a nation that will show forth in culture, in technology and in commerce, God’s investment in the black race.
“This is why today for every, some people say four blacks, some say five, one must be a Nigerian. That is not a mean attainment at all. That nation that God has in mind is a diverse nation. Diverse in resources, in ideas, in opinions. The kind of nation that we have, where there is an argument about something everywhere. Before you get tired of that lone argument, another one arise and before you finish with that one there is yet another one.
“This is the type of country that God has ordained. Where we have diversity of opinions, diversity of ideas. People saying their own things here and there. But, He has also planned that this country will remain together, and that we’ll be a nation that is gifted just as we have the oil, the gas, and the most arable lands than most continents.”.

from peoples daily