PRESIDENT Muhammadu Buhari has called on labour unions to allow his administration concentrate on fixing infrastructure in the country, rather than distracting it.
He spoke when a delegation of National Association of Nigerian Students (NANS) Executive Committee visited him in the State House, Abuja.
Buhari, in a statement by the Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, said: “In three and a half years, we have improved tremendously on what we met. We are trying to do infrastructure.
“No matter which part of the country you come from, you will see the efforts we are making in terms of roads; we are trying to fix rails, we are trying to do power, through the use of gas and solar. If you note what we have done in these three and a half years, you will not regret voting this administration into power.”
Buhari also said Nigeria was doing very well in agriculture as the country was about to attain food sufficiency and security.
Calling on the students to keep pleading with the Academic Staff Union of Universities (ASUU), the President assured that he would speak with the lecturers’ body “so that they don’t encroach on your efforts to qualify in time”.
The President said he had explained in details while presenting the 2019 budget estimates the earnings and expenditure and, therefore, expected the elite to understand the position of the government on certain issues.
Buhari added that it was the responsibility of government to look after the employed as well as the unemployed.
The President urged the youths to start preparing themselves to lead the country.
He said: “There is a tendency for you to think that you can do better than anybody, but it is very good for you to know the facts that leadership entails.”
He assured labour leaders that having been in positions of leadership at various stages in his life and with the experience, he meant well for Nigerians and workers and should be allowed to fix infrastructure so that more Nigerians could be taken out of the poverty cycle.
“I am totally loyal to this country. Whatever I do is in the interest of the ordinary people, especially those who do not have the benefit of being educated like you, and are just trusting whoever is leading them,” he said.
Buhari expressed gratitude to the students for appreciating some of the things his administration has been able to put in place and called on them to mobilise support for government, as it strives to make Nigeria a better place.
NANS President Danielson Bamidele Akpan hailed the administration for its efforts, especially in the transformation of the transportation sector as well as the decimation of terrorists in the Northeast.
Akpan, however, requested the government to intervene in the incessant strikes in the education sector, involve more youths in governance and look into the plight of students in different institutions, who have been expelled for ‘political’ reasons.
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