Insecurity: Sultan, Agwai, others preach unity, dialogue

SULTAN of Sokoto Abubakar Sa’ad III and former Chief of Defence Staff Gen. Martins Lurther Agwai have called for continued dialogue among the various nationalities

The duo said dialogue remained the only way to entrench peace and unity in the country. They spoke yesterday at the symposium and book presentation in honour of Agwai, who turned 70.

The book titled: “How a congress of baboon made a general” was written by Ms. Rebecca Agwai, daughter of the celebrator.

The Sultan stressed the need for unity among the people and also the need to always discuss national issues with sincerity.

He said: “There are problems facing us left, right and centre, insecurity problems everywhere just like part of the big moll, but we shall overcome them.

“We must not give up, there is hope as long as there are good people like Gen. Agwai who are struggling to put things together and bring us together in such a forum, and that is what we need in this country, let keep on talking to ourselves, let us never get tired of dialogue. Let us never get tired of telling ourselves the truth because as you all know, the truth can set us free.”

On his part, Gen. Agwai stresse the need to agree that there is a challenge, which according to him is the fundamental foundation to finding lasting solution.

He said: “Let us agree that there is a challenge; that is the first thing. If people don’t agree that there is a challenge, that itself is a challenge.

“When we agree that there is a challenge, then we put our heads together and say ‘what is the way forward. And I think the answer to that is that all of us have to look ahead, and try as much as possible, I didn’t say we should not know where we are coming from, but we shouldn’t so much dwell in the past.

“We should now conjure our condition, what do we want for our country? What is the way forward? And if we continue talking about the past, the past we continue hurting us. But if we agree, yes, the past has its own challenges, what is the way forward? What is the way forward for a new Nigeria? How do we get to that new Nigeria?

“With my little life of 70 years, at a local level, the leave in peace, they leave in harmony better than all of us in the cities. Again, we have to learn to forgive, not who is right. We have to start on a new slate. The new slate is to forgive ourselves, forget the past, and then build a solid new foundation for Nigeria.”

On alleged politicisation of security challenges, Gen. Agwai advised that “we should not allow politicians to use us. How many of us would see fire and go there? But a lot of us because of what I hear today as stomach infrastructure, we stop thinking with our brains. We forget that any temporary gain today, we are actually mortgaging our future.”

Former presidential candidate of the defunct National Redemption Congress (NRC), Bashir Tofa, asked some rhetoric questions bothering on the peace and unity of the country.

He said: “With people like you in this country, if I may ask, how is it that we have sunk so low in destroying one another..?  Why is it that we are friends as individuals but enemies as a community? Why is it that most of our people are so desperately poor and our active and intelligent youths are so left behind?

He challenged the celebrator through his Centre, the Martin Luther Agwai International Leadership and Peacekeeping Centre to find solution to the insecurity problems bedeviling the country.