*As Ango Abdullahi-led NEF Accuses Buhari, Govs of failure to Contain Insecurity in Northern States
By Hamilton Nwosa(Head, The New Diplomat’s Busines and data tracking desk)
The presidency has described the Northern Elders Forum(NEF) led by Prof Ango Abdullahi as a mere a one-man show, a paper-weight and an organization led by a General without troops.
Presidential spokesman, Mr Femi Adesina in a statement on Sunday night equated the NEF led by Ango Abdullahi, a retired Professor and a former Vice Chancellor of Ahmadu Bello University as a “ mere irritant and feather weight”, stressing that the “NEF is just Ango Abdullahi and Ango Abdullahi is NEF.”
He said: “ We are not surprised by this latest statement under the banner of the Northern Elders Forum(NEF). Hearing that title, you would think the body was a conglomeration of true elders. But the truth is that NEF is just Ango Abdullahi and Ango Abdullahi is NEF.
“It is a quasi-organization that boasts of no credible membership, and its leader is akin to a General without troops. Before the 2019 presidential election, the one-man army called NEF had shown antipathy against President Buhari and its preference for another candidate.
“They all got beaten together. NEF is merely waving flag that is at half-mast. President Buhari steadily and steadfastly focuses on the task of retooling Nigeria, and discerning Nigerians know the true state of the nation. They don’t need a paper tiger to tell them anything.”
It would be recalled that the NEF had in a statement on Saturday signed by its Convener , Prof Ango Abdullahi claimed that the level of insecurity in some northern states of the country was a clear manifestation of the inability of President Buhari and the governors of those states to manage the crisis.
According to the NEF, this trend is not good as it indicates that President Buhari and Governors of those designated Northern states had lost control of the security situation.
