…warns against dangers, urges Tinubu to meet demands
By Clement Adeyi
The National President of One Nigeria Group (ONG), a peace and unity Non-Governmental Organisation, Alhaji Muhammad Saleh Hassan, has called on the organisers of the looming nationwide hunger protests scheduled for August 1-10 to jettison the move because it might degenerate to a state of anarchy and doom.
Hassan who is also the Chairman of of Skymark Energy and Power, stated this in a statement in Abuja, the nation’s capital, on Thursday.
According to him, the protests being claimed to be peaceful by the planners whose identities have yet to be confirmed, is a harbinger of tears and sorrows because it has the likelihood of being hijacked by dissidents to unleash terror on the nation. If it shall be peaceful, fine but from the feelers we are getting, it might not be peaceful and should therefore be jettisoned.
“The looming planned nationwide hunger protests being purportedly organised by some groups and individuals smacks of plunging the country into a state of anarchy.
It’s a tacit threat to national peace, security of lives and property just like the #endSARS protests that dripped with tears and sorrow a few years ago in this country. Nobody should tread such path of melancholy again,” Hassan said.
“We call on all Nigerians to rise against it. Security agencies, Groups, Civil Society Organisations, religious leaders, sociopolitical and economic analysts, academics, lawmakers, legal practitioners and stakeholders from different spectrum should rise against it.
Parents and guardians should talk to their children to rescind the protest decision,” the advocate of unity and peace stressed.
Hassan also called on traditional rulers to drum messages of peace into the ears of their subjects, especially the youths and persuade them to shun the idea.
“Those whom President Tinubu recently invited to a meeting in A sick Rock for this purpose should remember to fulfil their promise to carry the messages to their people in their various domains,” he noted.
He added that the protest was retrogressive and antithetical to growth and development.
“The doom that the protest may elicit on the country and the citizenry, including the organisers too, has the potentialities of setting the country back and derail it from the sociopolitical and economic development as well as growth that it has struggled and still struggling to achieve,” he said.
He warned against replicating the bitter experiences suffered by some African countries that adopted protest as a means to fight against misrule.
“Let’s not replicate the scenarios in Kenya, Libya and Sudan where such protests were held but degenerated to anarchy and doom for the countries and the people. We should not copy a bad model that can never become a good model tomorrow. As the giant of Africa, Nigeria is too big to copy a wrong legacy from any small African country,” Hassan said.
“The youths should not draw us back by embarking on the protest with a mindset that its the best way to fight government for being responsible for hunger in the land.
The best way to fight government if it appears not to be doing well is to vote it out during an election. If anybody believes that the present administration is not doing creditably, he or she should use voting power to vote it out in 2027, but should not use protest to fight it,” he stressed.
“The planned protest should not be politicized. It is supposed to be peaceful. Protest is constitutional and normal if only it is peaceful. If the intention is genuine without breaking law and order I, too, can even participate in it. I can even mobilise members of One Nigeria Group to participate in it.
“The ONG’s mission is to preach peach and unity and to advocate good governance. But since it appears not to be peaceful because it might be hijacked, One Nigeria is not in support of it. We are not in support of any move that is antithetical to these ethos. We say outright no to it.
“Common sense is enough to tell the organisers that there is no best time and this not the time to embark on such a move because the intention behind it might be misunderstood, capitalized upon and hijacked by dissidents to carry out a different ulterior motive or agenda capable of landing the country in another jeopardy worse than hunger,” Hassan said.
Hassan also cautioned against the dangers of embarking on protest, noting that it can not be equated with life.
“It is the living that can eat. The dead do not know hunger. Life is more important than hunger. If the hungry is alive today, he must have food to eat tomorrow. We might be hungry today, but must not act in a way that we lose opportunity to eat tomorrow when food is available.
“Nigerians as well as any other nationality mulling the protest must understand that if there is hunger today, there might be food tomorrow. Let’s therefore be patient, maintain peace with the hope that the hunger shall be over because food shall come,” he said.
The Skymark Energy and Power boss called on the planners to jettison the idea and respect the sanctity of peace and national development.
“I appeal to them not to go ahead with it. It’s not good for the country. It is not even good for them too. Protest is not the way out. The best way is dialogue with the government. It’s a pleasure that some planners, especially Northern youths, have pulled out. We call on all others to also pull out.
“If it’s a genuine intention, then the planners should be willing to come to a round table with the government. President Tinubu might even be ready to come to table with them. I say this because we all have seen his readiness for such dialogue because of the olive branch that he has extended since the news of the looming protest hit the waves,” Hassan said.
“Only few days ago, he called traditional rulers such as the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi, the Sultan of Sokoto, Sa’ad Abubakar the Ulamas and others to a meeting at Aso Rock and addressed them on the need for them to take the message of peace and unity to their various domains, particularly their youths to persuade them to shelve the protest and look forward to the solution that government may provide to hunger, which is the bone of contention.
“Even before then, the president had taken some proactive measures to proffer solution to the hunger menace by providing some palliatives. Recently, the House of Representative members slashed their salaries by 50 percent to support the Federal Government in cushioning the effects of hunger.
Although these moves are not enough to solve the problem, it can still go far. These are signs that government is showing concern to solve the problems.
“We are all feeling the impacts of the poor economic situation. But if we all are to protest, how can we have a way forward out of the problems? Protest is just like adding salt to injury that’s just the reality.
The Dangote Refinery which has started working can reduce dollarisation of the economy by almost 30 percent. This can bring down the price of the dollar and demand for it and engender employment for the youths
that are trying to protest. The local government autonomy recently granted by the Supreme Court is also a great development galvanised by government.
“So, if the same thing that happened during the endSARS protest happens again, how will the refinery operate peacefully and give the youths employment and food? How will they be able to enjoy the grassroots development yearned for over the years? So, they don’t need to protest.
“The local government can have the opportunity to share the wealth of the country from bottom to top, not from top to bottom. This can provide over 30,000 people with employment.
“You don’t have to be in Dangote Refinery directly for you to gain employment. There are other strong companies like my own (Skymark Energy and Power Ltd) that buy refined oil products and distribute around the country which could be part of employment opportunity. These are great achievements and opportunities the youths need to celebrate and not to protest.
“The country is far more important than any thing else or any individual. If you don’t have a country, you cannot have a political party, you cannot have anything at all. This country is all we have, we don’t have anything more than this country.
Hassan stressed that since government had started meeting some of the demands with alacrity, the protest is no longer necessary.
“You have to be patient as the problems cannot be solved within a day or a year because the challenges accumulated from the past regimes. It’s not a miracle. It’s a process and we all have to go through it, that’s just the reality.
“President Tinubu should engage the youths in a dialogue. He should also invite Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), peace and unity NGOs, economic experts, farmers, market women and other stakeholders to a round table and discuss the way forward on food inflation, high cost of food and to end the hunger. Price control should be a major point of discussion to persuade farmers and marketers to desist from hiking prices of food stuff.
As a way of proffering solutions to hunger, Hassan also called on the president to solve the problem of fuel price which continues to rise and relatively responsible for high transport fares which also leads to increase in prices of food stuff, goods and services.
“The president should also cut cost of governance by pruning his 44- member executive and inject funds generated from their remunerations to food production and security,” Hassan said.
