Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari has urged the Nigerians living in Qatar to rekindle the spirit of patriotism and selfless service to encourage more foreign investment back home.
President Buhari held a town hall meeting with the Nigerian diaspora in Qatar on Sunday night during his two-day official visit to Qatar.
Speaking to the Nigerian community in Doha, the President assured the people that the federal government in Nigeria would continue to create the enabling environment for investments in the country, anchored on peace and security.
“We have abundant natural and human resources in the country, including huge oil and gas deposit. But the challenge is securing those installations and to persuade some of our countrymen to be more patriotic and stop sabotaging the installations,” Buhari told the audience comprising members of Nigerians in Diaspora Organisation (Nido) Qatar, officials of Nigerian embassy in Qatar and other guests invited for the occasion.
“When people are being abducted and some are being murdered, when installations are being blown up now and then, the incentive for people to invest in our infrastructure is quite slim,” the Nigerian president was frank, while replying to questions from the audience.
President Buhari also promised to look into the complaints of alleged denial of visas to families and relatives of Nigerians intending to visit the State of Qatar. The president said he would look into the matter to ascertain facts before committing an intervention.
“Like I tell Nigerians living in other countries, you must be good ambassadors of our country because globally things are quite difficult in terms of security and the economy,” Buhari told the Nigerians.
“For us in Nigeria, we are trying to do our best to reduce unemployment and we realised this quite early enough, that was why we campaigned on the diversification of the economy,” said Buhari.
Speaking about ending dependence on oil, the Nigerian president said the Nigerian sources of economy are diverse as they were pre-oil boom era. “We have to go back to agriculture, like in the good old days of cocoa, palm oil, palm kernel, cotton, ground nuts, hides and skins,” said Buhari.
On the fight against terrorism, the president told Nigerians living in Qatar that the military have made remarkable progress in dislodging Boko Haram terrorists from their previous strongholds in the northeastern part of the country.
“When we came in May 2015, the Boko Haram were effectively holding 14 local governments out of the 774 in Nigeria but today they are not holding a single local government,” said Buhari.
He said the military and law enforcement agencies were working very hard to prevent and counter Boko Haram attacks on soft targets in the country.
Earlier, Amadi Nwokocha, Nido president, welcomed the Nigerian president on behalf of the Nigerian community in Qatar. He shared some of the problems faced by the community, including the delay in the issuance of passports by the Nigerian authorities concerned.
Nwokocha expressed hope that President Buhari’s visit to Qatar will further strengthen the bilateral ties between the two countries besides enhancing co-operation in trade and investment.
President Muhammadu Buhari addressing Nigerians living in Qatar.
