Hon.Uche Harris Okonkwo.
If Nigeria must pull through this current nadir of despair, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu must double down speedily with creative solutions that will heal Nigerians’ pains and restore hope among the citizenry.
Hon. Uchenna Harris Okonkwo, renowned youths inspiration and presently, member representing Idemili North and South Federal Constituency of Anambra State, gave this admonition while reacting to the difficult challenges the nation is currently passing through, in a statement from his Consultant Media Office.
Advised Okonkwo amidst the #EndBadGovernance protests across the country, occasioned by massive hardship: “I appreciate his acknowledgement that he has heard Nigerians loud and clear. I reckon with his assertion that the buck stops at his table, because it should actually. He should proceed now to persuade Nigerians better by tested actions that will mitigate these afflictions decisively and sustainably.
“I endorse the irrepressible liberty of Nigerians to protest loudly but decently, just as I note with pride our youths restraints to act more maturely, especially in our southern landscape.
“This is because, as a representative of one of the largest and most populated Federal Constituencies in this country, I know first hand how deep the pains are, and how severe the traumas are becoming.
Okonkwo posited that it had been personally agonising to reconcile how a once “happiest people in Africa” cascaded “into this yoke we have been, simply on account of leadership failures and vision paralysis, over the last decade mostly”.
Such systemic leadership embarrassment which brought the citizens this low, he Said, remained the president’s biggest nut to crack by taking the hints of these protests to address, solve and reverse.
Stated he: “I, therefore, sincerely urge and appeal to everyone of us either in government or in leadership, to get more real in our zeal to serve our citizens responsibly and sensitively, aware that since democracy is our deliberate choice of governance, it grows and thrives from the people and for the people. We must then adjust to the reality that our citizens are getting impatient with increasing resolve to tell us point blank, when we mis-govern or misrepresent them.
“As tested and tolerant as Nigerians have endured in this decade of misery, it should not happen nor contemplated, by any act of arrogance or standard aloofness of the past, to suppress or deny them a let off for such high agony.
“I also call upon all security Agencies and personnel mobilised to suppress and contain an already depressed people, to rather protect and treat them with empathy, respect and love. It is a critical challenge to their call of duty and capacity for intelligence to skillfully sieve out the criminals and deal with them promptly, while they protect the legitimacy of citizens to show dissent or approval. They should note that these people protest for them too, since they are barred by law to express their own frustrations publicly.
“We know that the crown of every leader worthy of the name, comes with thorns, yet these thorns are the necessary tests for real praises when overcome, not before.
“Now that the President has spoken and confirmed his awareness of the dire situation, perhaps the urgency of now will be accelerated to truly make the people feel and see good governance louder and clearer. The hard truth is significant, that actions are the only wheels that bring results. He must absorb the heat as renewed strength to take actions to clean the stains of nepotism, reset the optics of palace grandeur and cut the costs of governance, and rein in the hordes of hate spinners pretending to love him more. Nigeria is his beat and every Nigerian, his employer.
“I salute all decent voices of dissent to bad governance, be it in Local, State or Federal Governments, especially those that maintained law and order, because they are the true sanitisers for creative hope, that must evolve as a compelling scrutiny for collective prosperity and development to endure”.
Commenting on the media exploitation by desperate malcontents to instigate ethnic attacks, especially against the people of the South-East, he cautioned everyone to pause and reflect that, if development had eluded us this much in peace time, prosperity would commit unfortunate suicide if that peace disappeared.
It’s a grave spectacle of history no sane person should romance, whether by mischief or poor sense, Okonkwo stated.
