From Sola Ojo, Kaduna
A member of the lower arm of the National Assembly, Abbas Tajudeen (APC – Zaria) has described Nigeria as a ‘work in progress’ in the wake of the country’s 61st Independence Day anniversary on October 1.
To him, the turnaround the country has witnessed in its 61 years of existence called for reflection, saying: ‘We need to take stock of who we are, and where we ought to be, at this age.’
The lawmaker, who stated this while receiving an award of House of Reps Member of the Year 2021 from Politics Today online newspaper’s publisher, Nasir Dambatta, in Kaduna, added that the country needed to retrace its step backwards with a view to right the wrong if any is identified.
The lawmaker has reportedly sponsored 77 bills to his legislative credit, for which he is believed to have the highest in the country so far, Dambatta noted while briefing the media on the rationale behind the lawmaker’s recognition.
According to the Zazzau born politician, ‘whoever is 61 years of age, whether a human being or a country, it is expected that such human or entity should be fully matured. It should also mean that all the work-in-progress that has started at inception should have been completed and it would be a period of consolidation then after.
‘However, in Nigeria, we can see that the state of the nation is still a work in progress with so many sectors still having issues, especially the issues of security, issues of economy, which we are not getting right as we should.
‘I, therefore, believe that this is the period whereby we need to reflect and see where we have gone wrong in the past and what we ought to do now so that before Nigeria will attend the age of 65, we should be able to put all our acts together to ensure that we all have a country that we should be proud of,’ he emphasised.
Speaking further about the country’s sixty-one years of independence, the lawmaker said that it was gladdening that the nation has remained one united and indivisible entity despite the challenges it has faced.
According to him, Nigeria has recorded significant progress over the last 61 years, which he believed called for celebration.
The lawmaker however expressed optimism that the Buhari administration would turn around every challenge the nation is currently facing to the benefit of Nigerians before 2023.