Speech by President Muhammadu Buhari at the Ramadan Breaking of Fast with the Diplomatic Corps

President Muhammadu Buhari Addressing  Diplomatic Corps

Protocols:

I welcome you all to this iftar dinner and I thank you for accepting my invitation. It has become an annual tradition which I am quite happy to maintain.

2. This Ramadan season is auspicious to me in one very important respect as it coincides with our administration’s first year in office. It has indeed been a challenging time for Nigeria. But our government has striven to meet these challenges head-on and with a proper commitment to address them. Much has been achieved but clearly much remains to be done.

3. As everyone knows, the security situation that we met at inception in May 2015 was one that portended great danger for the unity and territorial integrity of the country. Boko Haram was running rampant across the country seizing territories. Today, thanks to our motivated Armed Forces, Boko Haram has been technically defeated.

NIGER DELTA AVENGERS: HAS CRUDE OIL BECOME A CURSE? BY NDPM

The NIGER DELTA PEOPLE'S MOVEMENT will not stop talking

After the amalgamation of the Nigerian State in 1914 and the very day crude oil was discovered in a large commercial quantity and quality in the rural community of Oloibiri in present day Bayelsa State of Niger Delta Region: Peaceful co-existence and harmony eluded us. It ushered in violence, inter and intra-Communal conflicts, hate, underdevelopment, poverty, ecological damage, youths restiveness and neglect became normal way of live in the communities where these rare natural resources were deposited by nature.

The NIGER DELTA PEOPLE'S MOVEMENT also observed that, over the years, our resources have been used to sustain the political administrative live wire of Nigeria to the exclusion of the region. It is worthy of note that, Niger Delta witnessed the emergence of very great and prominent sons and daughters, who effortlessly without recourse to violence agitated for regional transformation and human capacity development. They were coordinated, peaceful, wise and had the people's plight as their driving force and source of inspiration.