SOME Nigerians on Friday took to the streets of London, United Kingdom, to protest against alleged killings and general insecurity in the South East region of the country.
The protest which was reported by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) was staged on a day President Muhammadu Buhari was supposed to arrive in London for a check up. The president, however, postponed the trip without giving reasons.
According to the BBC, the protesters moved from Trafalgar Square to the Nigerian House in London to register their displeasure over the insecurity in the South East region.
The protesters, who were dressed in Igbo attires, were shown on live video chanting: “Enough is enough, stop killing the Igbos, Igbos have mothers too.”
The BBC also quoted one of the protesters as saying: “The Nigerian Army, police are in the South East killing our youths. Our parents have been maimed, our mothers have been raped, kidnapped, we are being marginalised.
“The police, the army have no right to be in Igbo land, they should go to the North, children are being kidnapped, the army should go there and rescue them.
“Enough is enough, they have no reason to come after us, they have refused to give us part of the national cake but we are a people who strive and work hard and make a living for ourselves. They should let us be!”
Meanwhile, the Presidency announced the postponement of the medical check-up visit of President Buhari to the United Kingdom earlier scheduled for Friday, June 25.
A statement by Mr Femi Adesina, Special Adviser to the President (Media and Publicity), which contained the announcement on Friday, said a new date would be announced in due course.
Buhari was expected to have left for the United Kingdom Friday for the check up as a follow-up on the one he made in March this year.
Tell Nigerians real reason behind medical trip postponement – PDP
Meanwhile, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has called on President Buhari to come clean on the real reason behind the last minute cancellation of his London trip.
The main opposition party made the demand in a statement by Mr Kola Ologbondiyan, its National Publicity Secretary, on Friday, saying that the party’s position is predicated on the “increasing international disapprovals to the escalated human right violations, constitutional breaches, clampdown on citizens, suppression of free speech and other excesses by the Buhari administration, for which there have been concerted demands for travel restrictions against officials of the Buhari Presidency.”
The statement said while the President is left to sort out whatever impediments or constraints that led to the sudden cancellation of his scheduled medical trip, he should use this period to “have some introspection on the sorry situation in which his incompetent, divisive, vindictive and suppressive administration has pushed our nation into in the last six years.”
The party urged President Buhari to also use this period to reflect on the suffering of millions of Nigerians who do not have access to foreign medical treatment, but who are dying on daily basis because of his alleged failure to pay attention to our healthcare system, which has become decrepit under his watch.
PDP said: “In his consideration, Mr President must also reflect on how he has wrecked our country’s once robust economy that was handed over to him in 2015 by the PDP, to the extent that Nigerians can no longer afford to feed because their purchasing power has become depressingly low while he (Mr President) recedes further into the luxury and the safety of the Aso Rock Villa at the expense of the well-being of the ordinary citizens.
“It is indeed heartrending that President Buhari appears to think of himself only even as Nigerians pass through these worst forms of hardship occasioned by his own misrule.
“Nigerians are also dismayed that Mr President has consistently failed to honour his pre-2015 campaign promise not to embark on medical tourism if elected President.
“President Buhari, therefore, ought to be aware that the only condition in which history will be kind to him, as he has always wished, is if he honours his own words as well as use this period to resolve the impasse between the Nigeria Medical Association (NMA) and his administration, fix our hospitals and confront other challenges facing the health sector in our country.”
