Story from Sa’adatu MAINA, Damaturu
Yobe State former Head of Service (HOS) Alhaji Ibrahim Abdulrahman, has commended the directive by President Muhammadu Buhari on the rehabilitation of the National Food Reserve Agency.
Buhari, in his independence day speech, directed the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to liaise with security outfits, Nigeria Commodity Exchange and the National Assembly to rehabilitate the agency, noting that renovating the agency would tackle food hoarding and artificial scarcity created by some middlemen, that has led to increasing prices of food commodities.
Abdulrahman appreciating the effort of the president said the directive would also tackle post-harvest losses experienced by most farmers in the country.
“This year we predict a bumper harvest in some parts of the North-East; therefore, you can see that the directive couldn’t have come at a better time.
“You must have a storage capacity to take care of the excess, surplus crops produced, to last for a long time otherwise it becomes rotten,” he said.
The former HOS, who is also a full-time farmer, however, advised the Federal Government to revisit the issue of subsidizing fertilizer for farmers.
“Currently, there is fertilizer in abundance, but the price remains high because of involvement of third party, instead of buying directly from the wholesalers.
“Previously, the price was N5,000 per bag; it is now N10,000,” he said.
On security, he also commended the President for insisting that the unity of Nigeria is non-negotiable.
“The President must go tough on any individual or group that want to truncate our hard-earned democracy using money and other subversive activities and run to live abroad. This must be stopped.
“Thank God there appears to be progress made as evident in the repentance of 8,000 insurgents, this is due to appropriate steps taken by government for the security of this country.
“Even yesterday, I saw 15 armoured tankers in Damaturu heading to Maiduguri; this is a welcome development.
“With the 17,000 military personnel recruited and the 10,000 policemen to be recruited annually for six years, the end of security challenges in the country is in sight,” he said.
Abdulrahman advised governments at all levels to always accord priority to completing existing projects instead of initiating new ones.
“Government is a continuous process. Leaving behind abandoned projects is a serious problem that brought about huge losses to this country,” he noted.
