$2billion Arms Fraud: Nigerians were Betrayed-Buhari.
President Muhammadu Buhari has said that the $2billion arms fraud being investigated by anti-corruption agencies in the country has shown that Nigerians were betrayed describing the action as a betrayal of trust at all levels.
Speaking at a dinner he held in honour of members of the House of Representatives, Buhari described the revelation of corruption at the ongoing investigation into the arms procurement probe as most unfortunate.
Noting that the biggest ckallenge facing the country currently was the Boko Haram insurgency, the President told the lawmakers that ‘the objective of his administration is firstly to secure the country and proceed to efficiently manage it’.
He disclosed that was why he changed the leadership of the armed forces and appointed new Service Chiefs with a clear mandate to re-organize, retrain and equip the army in other to neutralize the Boko Haram sect.
Regretting that while the nation was spending its meager resources to ensure that the morale of security agents was raised, Buhari said it is unfortunate that those saddled with the responsibility of acquiring equipment weapons for the military betrayed the trust adding that his government will not keep quiet about the revelations.
Continuing Buhari said, ‘The situation got to a stage that the Nigerian military which was known for its global exploits could not secure 14 out of the nation’s 74 local governments.
His words, “We expended the meager resources we have to ensure the morale of the military is raised by getting officers to be on ground with the men but unfortunately for us, as a people; there was abuse of trust at various levels which cost Nigerians a lot of lives and goodwill’.
“We cannot keep quiet about this. It is very unfortunate. It is a known fact that Nigeria earned its respect from Burma to Zaire to Liberia to Sierra Leone. But it reached a state where the Nigerian military could not secure 14 out of the nation’s 774 local governments”.
Insisting that Boko Haram insurgency was not about religion, Buhari said, it would be wrong to read religious meanings into the activities of the sect as it is against the doctrine of any religion that worshipers and children should be killed.
“Let us make up our minds that whatever we are doing, we are doing it for the country. Let us secure the country. Let us efficiently manage the country” he said.
Recalling that “This is the reason why I was up and down to Niger, Chad, Cameroon, Benin and Germany to meet the leaders of G7 and the leaders of international community to put our case forward which is well known, Buhari said, “If in the capital of a developed country, 130 people were killed, who is Nigeria? We have a problem but are very lucky that the intention of the terrorist’s is to divide the country but I think they have misfired”.
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