Nigeria: Tinubu Has You in Mind, Shettima Tells Nigerians

13 March 2024

Vice President Kashim Shettima has told Nigerians to rest assured that President Bola Tinubu has the country in mind, admitting that Nigeria is currently facing daunting challenges.

He said the government is not apportioning blames as it is conscious that leadership is about accepting responsibilities and finding solutions to national challenges.

Shettima stated these during the public presentation of the book entitled: "Beating All Odds: Diaries and Essays on How Bola Tinubu Became President", written by the chairman, Editorial board of The Nation Newspaper, Sam Omatseye, in Abuja on Tuesday.

He described President Tinubu as man of courage and conviction who took far reaching decisions within a week in office such as the removal fuel subsidy and correction of multiple exchange rates regime which had been the country's major economic albatross.

He said, "The President is a man of courage and conviction. In the first one week in office, he took far reaching decisions. Oil subsidy has been adventurous fang in the neck of Nigerian economy and the Nigerian nation.

"He took the bull by the horns and withdrew the fuel subsidy from day one; he was able to correct the multiple exchange rates regime that gave room for a lot of hanky-panky, and rest assured that in the fullness of time, history will be kind to him", the vice president said.

He also described the 2023 general election as the most divisive in the history of the country, having widened Nigeria's ethno-religious fault lines that were deliberately manipulated for political aims, but Tinubu being the pan-Nigerian candidate emerged victorious.

On the book, the Vice President said in "Beating All Odds," Omatseye did not only set out to share his personal diaries as a well-read political historian but has given the world a three-dimensional view of a Nigeria President Tinubu inherited, with brick after brick of elegant words, one profound essay after another."

He said the author successfully underlined both the delicate, concrete, private and public, as well as the kind and the mean turns of events that led to this electoral outcome.

"Our recourse to facts in this climate of propaganda and lies would disinfect the minds of the impressionable, and this book does justice to the subject of President Tinubu's ascent up the ladder of glories as the recipient of the nation's highest honour - the office of the President. I believe this book is an interaction with time, a record of the science and miracle of our journey to this height.

"His Excellency, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is a political phenomenon; even those who attempted to undermine him live to confess to this fact. The President's years of building people and relationships played out during the elections, and this book provides sufficient material for curious minds."

On his part, president of the Senate, Senator Godswill Akpabio, urged Nigerians and all arms of government to give Tinubu the needed support to succeed in the task of governance, adding that with the renewed hope agenda and commitment to national duty as well as perseverance, the country shall eventually reach the promised land.

Represented by the Senate Deputy Chief Whip, Senator Peter Onyekachi Nwebony, Akpabio said the book is not just a testimony of the indomitable spirit of one man but represents a beacon of hope and resilience for the entire nation.

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