The Deputy President of the Senate, Senator Ovie Omo-Agege, said Nigeria has made significant progress 50 years after the civil war.
The Nigeria’s civil war started on the 6th of July, 1967 and ended on the 15th of January, 1970.
Omo-Agege, who spoke on Saturday night in Abuja at the 50th anniversary of the 1970 set of the Nigerian Military School, Zaria, Kaduna state, said he was impressed with what the country had recorded 50 years after the civil war.
The deputy senate president said the class of 1970 of NMS, Zaria, was an important turning point in the history of the country
because, it was the year the civil war ended.
He said: “It is important to point out the symbolic significance of your class in terms of the unity and indivisibility of our great country Nigeria. This class of 1970 came into being at such an important turning point in Nigeria’s history. It was the year the Nigerian civil war ended.
“In the fifty years since the war ended, Nigeria has made progress: twenty-one years of uninterrupted democratic rule; biggest economy in Africa; thirty-six-states sub-national administrative structure, a new federal, free press among others, are phrases used to describe our country.
” I am proud of what we have achieved together as a country. And a lot of the credit goes to the alumni of this great school including, especially, members of class 1970″.
He, however, said the country’s progress has not been steady, and called on the alumni of the school to ” continue to find creative solutions to the myriad of problems facing our country”.
Earlier, the interim committee Chairman of the class, who is also the former Secretary to the Government of the Federation, Engr. Babachir Lawal, said 96 students started the class 50 years ago, adding that 34 of them are now late.
Lawal, who remembered his days and those of his classmates during their school days with nostalgia, thanked God for the successes members of the class had recorded in their chosen professions.
