A right organization, Campaign for Dignity in Governance (CDG), has taken a critical look at the a press statement emanated from the President, Arewa Youth Consultative Forum (AYCF), Comrade Yerima Shettima alleging marginalization of the northerners in Lagos in the distribution of palliatives to the residents and described it, “as misplaced priority and outlandish.”
A signed release from a Co-Convener of the group, Hajia Ramat Abdur-Razaq, wondered how a so called Nation Leader of a youth organization should descend so low as to see issues of national and global concern through a parochial lens!
According to her, the government Shettima is criticising in Lagos has got commendation from the two respected global bodies, the World Health Organizatio (WHO) and the United Nation (UN), for doing well in handling the dreaded coronavirus, a disease with high rate of fatality potential.
“If Shettima and his co travellers cannot team up with Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu and his team to forge ahead in the war against our collective enemy, he is not expected to cause a detraction for a government that is on course in its effort at guarantee the survival of the generality of the people,” Abdur-Razaq observed.
The concerned woman activist expects Shettima to appreciate the accommodating nature of Lagos that deemed it appropriate to give a commissioner slot to the Arewa Community that he (Shettima), claims to be fighting for, wondering if any Yoruba man is enjoying such a privilege in Kaduna, his home state.
Abdur-Razaq said, even Governor Nasir el-Rufai has declared severally that COVID-19 is real and not fake and he has therefore lockdown the state for a month, reasoning that, remarks from people of Shettima’s calibre are expected to centre on how to back the authorities in their efforts at winning the Coronavirus war.
“Raising allegation and accusation about food handout, to us in the CDG, is nothing but petty, parochial and trivial. And the situation we are now calls for collective efforts at ridding the entire country of the deadly monster that has respect for nobody irrespective of social status, political leanings or religious affiliation,” she pointed out.
The more worrisome about Shettima’s foul outburst, Abdur-Razaq pointed out, is the beggary connotation the statement portrayed, reminding him that, the era of encouraging Almajiri tendency is moving out of fashion in the north.
She was the opinion that Shettima should have with the likes of former Emir Lamido Sanusi Lamido of Kano State whose passion is to see a better north where children would be in schools with a view to having a better future devoid of backward citizen.
The woman right crusader said, what happened to Sanusi is definitely going to be a blessing that would throw him up as the Hero of the north to be worshiped, emphasising that, what the north needs now is not palliatives from anywhere but looking inward to make the life of our people better and our future brighter.
