By Andrew Onyejuruuwa
In a move to clarify the recent claim by President Muhammed Buhari that his second coming will be tough for Nigerians, Mr. Boss Mustafa, Secretary to the Government of Federation (SGF), has explained that the tough decisions the President talked about during his second term in office would be in the interest of Nigeria.
Buhari was declared winner of the February 23, 2019 presidential elections by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), which his main challenger, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar said he would contest in court. Already, it is understood that Atiku, who claim to have overwhelming evidence that Buhari’s party, the All Progressive Congress (APC) rigged the election has assembled a team of legal minds to challenge the results. However, Mustafa, in an interview with newsmen in Yola on Monday, allayed the fears expressed in some quarters following a statement by the president that his second term would be tough.
He said, “When we came to power in 2015 about 27 states couldn’t pay salaries; we had to take tough decisions like giving them bailout and Paris Club refund. These are tough decisions,” Mustafa said. He also identified the ban on rice and fertilizer importation as one of the tough decisions taken by the government and which yielded positive results by boosting local production, among other things.
“By such tough decisions we are able to raise the number of rice farmers from 4 million to 12 million and we are about 98 per cent self-sufficient in rice. Due to the establishment of many fertilizer blending plants after we banned the importation of fertilizer, the product is now available and the prize is going down,” Mustafa added.
