Daniel Atori 
Former Military Head of State, General Abdulsalami Abubakar, yesterday in Minna, Niger State called on the President Bola Tinubuled government to act swiftly on how to cushion the economic hardship faced by the country rather than just sharing palliatives to the people.
General Abdulsalami while taking a critical look at the condition of living of Nigerians said “the hardship in the land is getting out of control”.
While speaking when he played host to the leadership of the Campaign NNPP to probe dissolved executives, suspends 6 Johnchuks Onuanyim Abuja The National Leadership of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) has said it is ready to probe some members of the recently dissolved executive, just as the party announced suspension of six members in the South West zone.
The party had earlier dissolved the executives of Taraba, Benue, Oyo, Bauchi and Gombe states in the first week of September citing the need to reposition the party for Democracy and Human Rights, led by Comrade Abdullahi Mohammed Jabi, in his Minna residence, the former Head of State declared that: “We will continue to encourage the government to introduce measures to soften the hardship.” According to him: “The federal, states and local governments should see how they can cushion this economic hardship.
“Everybody is crying of this hardship and it seems to be getting out of control, people cannot afford three square meals, the issue of transportation, the hike in fuel, the hike in school fees for the children and the lack of funds in everybody’s pocket is making life difficult for everybody.”
While responding to an appeal made by the team to prevail on President Tinubu to find solutions to the hunger in the land, the former military Head of State said he belongs to a forum that had made recommendations to the Federal Government on the way out for the economic hardship in the country.
Accordingly, he said: “I will like to intimate you that in some of the proposals we have given to the government on another platform, (he did not mention the platform), we said that ‘giving palliatives is not the answer’ to the high prices of food and other items in the country.
“But that, there is a need for the government to flood and saturate the communities with food, let them (government) buy food and sell it at lower prices to the people so that people will try to buy some of these food items depending on their pockets/income. “We have passed these recommendations to the government, we hope they will implement it.”
Reacting to the planned #EndBadGovernance protest slated for October 1, General Abdulsalami appealed to Nigerians to demonstrate peacefully, recalling that in the last demonstration: “We saw unnecessary, uncalled for carnage, theft and criminalities.” He added: “People instead of demonstrating went about looting even private houses.
Private individuals suffered in the hands of the demonstrators. “If at all we are going to demonstrate let us know this is why we are demonstrating let us not inflict hardship on fellow Nigerians.”
Furthermore, he appealed to the government to listen to the demonstrators stressing that: “You cannot beat a child and prevent it from crying.”
Earlier, the leader of the delegation, Comrade Abdullahi Jabi, had said that they were in his residence to rejoice with him on the celebration of his birthday and prayed for long life and good health for him. He drew the attention of their host to the prevailing hunger in the land and urged him to help prevail on the Federal Government to solve the problem.
