A former CEO of the National Health Insurance Scheme, Prof. Usman Yusuf, has painted a grim picture of the country’s security situation and expressed concern that it has taken hold of Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
According to him, the situation contrasts from what it used to be in the past, saying past leaders felt more secure than today’s leaders, who, without strong protection, cannot go back to their ancestral houses.
Speaking in an interview with Daily Trust TV, Yusuf cited the late President Shehu Shagari, who didn’t need any kind of security measures to enter his Sokoto residence unlike the current state of insecurity, which he blamed on poverty and a failure to address problems at the local level.
”You finish as Chief of Army Staff and you can’t go back to your ancestral home to spend the weekend without those big guns security. This is not how leaders in the past lived,” he said.
“The late President Shehu Shagari went back to Sokoto and you could access his home from the main road. You could go in and see him. Even former President Muhammadu Buhari cannot stay in Daura without those big guns.
“You finish all your Abuja trip and you cannot go back home. And that is why everybody is in Abuja as an IDP.
“All of us carried the pregnancy and gave birth to these monsters we call insecurity. Now Abuja is not safe, everybody is sweating under the collar because it’s closing in on the seat of power.
“If you ignore the grassroots and leave the poverty, do you think it’s going to remain there? No, it will get to you. And this is not surprising for me, it’s going to get worse if we don’t take care of this.”
