The Igbo Leaders of Thought (ILT), under the leadership of a foremost constitutional lawyer, Prof. Ben Nwabueze, has said that corruption is not Nigeria’s primary problem, and called on the Federal Government to address other critical problems.
The Igbo leaders say government’s current pre-occupation with the anti-corruption campaign has relegated other serious national challenges to the background.
Nwabueze, who spoke with reporters after their meeting in Enugu yesterday, faulted President Muhammadu Buhari’s Independence speech on his administration’s resolve to tackle corruption as Nigeria’s number one enemy, stating that the national question has an intimate connection with corruption as a fundamental cause of it.
The elder statesman stressed that recent events in the country had proved beyond doubt that it is not corruption, but the national question that threatens the continued existence of Nigeria.
He said: “Everybody is thinking that all that we need is to fight corruption; it is important, but it is not our primary problem. “There are other issues that are even more important than corruption.”
Besides, the Igbo leaders attributed rising agitations in the country for Biafra, Niger Delta and Oduduwa republics to the failure of past and present administrations to resolve the national question, stressing that restructuring and setting up peace and reconciliation commission were the way to go.
They also asked Buhari to halt the alleged corruption at the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) by thoroughly investigating the feud between the Group Managing Director (GMD) of the corporation and the Minister of State for Petroleum).
The leaders stated that the near silence over developments at the NNPC could give wrong signals that the war against corruption was targeted at few persons in the country.
Also, in the communiqué issued after the meeting and read by its Secretary-General, Prof. Elochukwu Amucheazi, the group observed a total lack of action directed at the problem of national question, saying: “There is a total failure to recognise the existence of the problem that denies justice and equal treatment to some ethnic nationalities and exclusion from Federal Government.
“There are other issues that are even more important than corruption. “We have the question of illiteracy, poverty and security.”
