Vice President Kashim Shettima, on Friday, said the President Bola Tinubu-led government was resolute to end the reign of terror in Nigeria’s South-East fueled by those he called “self-serving criminals” taking advantage of the security situation to foster their political agenda.
“The problem we are here to solve as a community, as an Umunna, is a creation of self-serving criminals who do not represent the interests of the Ndi-Igbo and Nigerians,” Shettima said in Bende, Abia State, when he unveiled the Peace in South East Project by the Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, Benjamin Kalu.
His comments came over three weeks after he advocated the adoption of non-kinetic mechanisms to tackling insecurity in the South-East.
Shettima, who received a delegation led by the Deputy Speaker at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, on December 5, said, “The approach is the most beautiful I have seen so far. We need to build bridges, there is a need for a handshake; that way, those that have not been radicalised can be captured.”
VP Shettima reasoned that the terror groups that had held the South-East to ransom were not created by the people of the region, or of Nigerians from other parts of the country.
He revealed that the criminals disrupting the peace in the South-East are doing so in connivance with “forces exploiting the situation for dangerous political agenda,” adding that attempts to undo the hard work of the nation’s heroes past will fail.
However, the VP maintained that the situation cannnot be reversed unless the government involves the people whom he said are its ears, legs and mouths in the region.
“Today, we stand united to firmly declare: enough is enough,” Shettima stated, stressing the need for a coordinated intervention to tackle insecurity in the region head-on.
He promised that the Tinubu administration “shall not rest until it fulfills its pledge to mitigate the crisis” it inherited.
