Obasanjo, Gumi’s meeting fails to address nation’s problems, says YCE

The Yoruba Council of Elders (YCE), yesterday, said the meeting between former President Olusegun Obasanjo and renowned Islamic scholar, Sheik Ahmad Gumi, was cosmetic, saying it failed to address the problem of insecurity and other fundamental issues bedeviling the country.

Obasanjo and Gumi had met in Abeokuta, Ogun State, some days ago as part of continued efforts to find lasting solutions to the general insecurity in the country.

Secretary-General of YCE, Dr. Kunle Olajide, who spoke at the meeting, said he did not read anywhere that their discussion addressed the issues of herdsmen, social justice, and the defective 1999 Constitution.

Olajide said: “The meeting was a good start but it failed to address the very cogent problem of insecurity in Nigeria. Any talk or communique aimed at addressing and solving security challenges in the country that fails to specifically talk about criminal herdsmen and herdsmen in general who destroy farms, the basis of the economy of the vast majority of Yoruba people, is cosmetic. It did not address the key issues.

“I did not see social justice mentioned. Such a serious meeting ought to have talked about that.”

He said that any conclave that fails to talk about herdsmen, banning open grazing that is no longer modern but destroys the basis of the economy of the people, has not hit the nail on the head.

“Any serious security meeting that fails to talk about herdsmen, banning of open grazing that is no longer modern and destroys the basis of the economy of the people, has not hit the nail on the head.

“Any talk on security that does not talk about this terrible constitution, which gives a lot of power and money to the chief executives both at the federal and state levels, I cannot imagine that,” he added.