Saraki lauds army over purchase of made-in-Nigeria shoes

• Police officers allege injustices in postings, transfers

Senate President Bukola Saraki has commended the Nigerian Army (NA) for its decision to purchase 50,000 pairs of shoes from local manufacturers in Aba for the use of its officers and soldiers.

In a statement by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Yusuph Olaniyonu, Saraki said the decision to patronise Made-in-Nigeria foot-wears was a good example, which showed the Force as a pacesetter and a truly national institution, which is ready to contribute its quota in ending the present economic recession in the country.

The Senate President urged other military and paramilitary forces like the Air Force, Navy, Police, Civil Defence Corps and the National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) to emulate the Army by immediately banning the purchase of all imported footwears in preference for locally-produced ones.

He also implored the military and paramilitary agencies not to limit their patronage and promotion of Made-in-Nigeria goods to only shoes, but other items that could be sourced locally, while also commending the Air Force for its co-operation with Innoson Motor Group in the area of manufacturing of some aircraft parts.

He said: “This is the essence of the amendment of the Public Procurement Act by the Senate since June. The new law compels all Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) to compulsorily give preference to goods and services, which can be sourced locally. We believe one of the gains that our country will derive from this recession is to make our people look inward and patronise locally-made goods.”

In another development, members of the senior officers cadre of the Nigeria Police Force have engaged in murmuring and bickering against the Inspector-General (IG) of Police, Ibrahim Idris, over what they called “witch-hunting and injustice” in the transfer and postings across the country.

While some alleged that the IGP had flooded strategic commands and units with his ‘kinsmen’ from Niger State, others believe that he embarked on vendetta against officers who have a hope of becoming an IGP.

Some of them are protesting the deployment of the Assistant Inspector-General of Police (AIG), Zone 2, Abdulmajid Ali, to Force Headquarters, Abuja.

According to the aggrieved policemen: “We have never seen such remarkable improvement in the zone before now. We are protesting because we are sure that he is a victim of dirty politics and favouritism, which will not augur well for the police. Since he assumed duties here, he commenced massive training of officers and men of the zone by establishing a tactical training ground in Ogun and Ikorodu in Lagos State. He also set up three zonal intervention squads to track kidnappers, thereby bringing sanity to the zone.

“We are therefore calling on the IGP to reconsider the posting in view of the fact that we have seen a new dawn in the volatile zone and his removal would dampen the spirit of handwork which he planted in us.”

Saraki, who advised the federal and state governments to encourage local manufacturers by providing them with necessary infrastructure, loans, patronage and helping them to improve on the quality of their goods as well as facilitating their ability to access the export market, implored organised groups like the National Economic Summit Group (NESG), associations in the field of marketing communications and others who can help in the areas of packaging, sales promotion and quality enhancement.