Nigeria@61: We Are Resilient People -Muhammad Sanusi

FORMER Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Muhammad Sanusi has described Nigerians as a resilient people who have the ability to come back from different depths of low.

The Ex-CBN Boss said, Nigeria has gone through different difficult times in the past, we have gone through a civil war, economic crises and all that, and it is to that extent I think even in this dark moment, there is a light at the end of the tunnel. And so I am optimistic that things can change but it all boils down to the kind of leadership we chose as a country and the attitude to leadership.

In his words, “the great strength of Nigeria is the resilience of its people, their willingness and commitment to put in the best, their desire to compete, achieve and ability to come back from the depth of lows.

Sanusi also said “I think our weakness is in our inability to see beyond sentiments and have an open intellectual approach to issues; we lag behind the rest of the world in our capacity to understand the role of vested interest and the manipulation of public opinion by a few elites to profit from some situations in Nigeria

There is the issue of international environment, the collapses in oil prices, the decline in net exports, we’ve had lots of wrongheaded policies that have led to serious economic crises, there is the fight that for decades decision that should have been taking to place this nation on the part of economic sustainability have not been taking, there are security challenges

Sanusi wished all Nigerians a happy Independence Day celebration and appealed to politicians to stop playing identity politics. Our challenge as a nation, is not in our diversity, it is not in our complexity, the challenge has been in the inability of the leadership to forge a nation

He urged Nigerians to choose their leaders in line with the dictates of the constitution and deepen the definition of diversity in the constitution to include the women and the youth.