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By Lawrence Agbo
President Bola Tinubu has come under fire from African Democratic Congress leader Kenneth Okonkwo for going ahead with his scheduled state visit to the United Kingdom despite the recent explosions in Maiduguri, Borno State.
Speaking on Channels Television’s Politics Today, Okonkwo accused the president of showing disregard for victims of the attacks, stating that cancelling the trip would have demonstrated respect for those killed and injured.
He described the visit as ill-timed, arguing that national mourning should take precedence over foreign engagements.
“It’s about telling the world that you prefer to respect the blood of your martyrs to riding on their blood and dancing on their graves in the United Kingdom.
“That red carpet there is the blood of the martyrs that Tinubu is treading upon. He should have cancelled it (UK Visit), cancelled it without equivocation,” Okonkwo said.
Okonkwo further criticised the decision for the president to travel alongside the Minister of Defence. At the same time, Vice President Kashim Shettima attended a political event in Anambra State to attend the second-term swearing-in ceremony of Governor Chukwuma Soludo, describing the situation as embarrassing.
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“Why go with your minister of defence? Why would the vice president be celebrating in Anambra State? I can’t believe it, I feel embarrassed. You don’t understand that the death of one military man is a hit to a nation because their morale is boosted when you at least recognise.
“As they are going to fight, it can be any of them, so they derive their morale from how you treat the one that has fallen,” he said.
The ADC chieftain also aimed at the administration’s handling of security, alleging that the government has failed to tackle rising violence across the country effectively.
He argued that worsening economic hardship and ungoverned spaces are fueling insecurity and recruitment into criminal activities.
“I was in your station the early days of Tinubu, and I told you that state police will not come, that Tinubu will continue to play the politics of it, and I tell you that Tinubu is incapable of solving the security problems and that is why it is metastasising all over the nation.
“So he is incapable, why? You don’t have enough boots on the ground, you have a lot of ungoverned spaces, hunger and hardship is increasing, suffering of people is increasing, they are easy to be recruited, criminality is not being punished,” Okonkwo added.
The criticism follows coordinated bomb attacks in Maiduguri that left about 23 people dead and more than 100 injured, intensifying concerns over Nigeria’s security challenges.
