By Bode Olagoke
Abuja
Former Vice President and chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Atiku Abubakar, has declared that the major problems facing the country “are not corruption or lack of power, but lack of unity.”
The Wazirin Adamawa, who made reference to the Bible and Quran, said, “we can never have a Nigeria that fulfills her full potential when we have a divided Nigeria.”
Atiku, in an opinion article posted on his Facebook page yesterday, sourced by Blueprint, said, all nations or regions that had expelled people from their landmass on the basis of race, religion or political affiliation had been the poorer for it.
He said: “The number one problem plaguing Nigeria is not corruption or even the absence of regular power. The number one problem militating against the progress of Nigeria is her lack of unity.
“An objective look at history will show that without exception, all nations or regions that have expelled people from their landmass on the basis of race, religion or political affiliation have been the poorer for it, whether you are talking of the Alhambra Decree which purged Jews from Spain in 1492, or of more recent events like the purge of Asians from Uganda in 1972.
“Nigerians may recall the Ghana Must Go purge of 1983 which led to the forced departure of over a million Ghanaians from Nigeria. Nigeria lost many skilled workers and small businesses when the Ghanaians left. But they went home and developed their country and today Ghana is the top destination for Nigerians wishing to study abroad.”
Scribbling further, the former VP said: “Because of how these immigrants helped to develop and organise their country, there are over a quarter of a million Nigerians in Ghana today, and the Ghanaians have coined the phrase Nigerians are coming to identify this phenomenon.
“We must learn from history. We do not have to repeat history. We must learn from the mistakes of other people. As Albert Einstein famously said, the definition of insanity is to do the same thing and expect a different result.
“It would be insane if a nation that once sang the song of Go On With One Nigeria should be seen to be singing a new and absurd song of Go On Without Some Nigerians.
“What that would mean is that the sacrifices of the millions of men, women, and children who died in the process of keeping Nigeria one, would have been a sacrifice made in vain.
“We have six geopolitical zones in Nigeria and I was one of those that participated in bringing this about at the 1995 Constitutional Conference. The reasoning behind this is the awareness that none of us is as great as all of us.”
He, however, expressed confidence that, “as I write this, I am certain that Nigeria will not be overcome by evil people, rather, the good people of Nigeria will overcome evil and Nigeria will be better for it.”
