President Muhammadu Buhari has expressed his confidence that Nigeriens would come to his defence if anyone moves against him after leaving office.
The outgoing president made the comment on Tuesday at the commissioning of the new corporate headquarters of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) in Abuja.
The president who spoke without recourse to a prepared speech said that he was speaking his mind, while reassuring that he would be far away from Abuja, at the end of his administration.
His words, “That is why when I became the Head of State that is President, my first visit was to Niger, Chad and Cameroon because based on personal and national issues, neighbourhood is very important.
“If you don’t secure the confidence and cooperation of your neighbours, you are in trouble. Your children and grandchildren will be in trouble.
“So it is very good that I established a relationship with my neighbours. I said these few things about my personal belief because I have only six more days to go. And I try to plan to be as far away from Abuja as possible. Thank goodness, I come from an area which is far away from Abuja. I said if anybody forces me, I have a good relationship with my neighbours. Niger people will defend me.”
Speaking on why he appointed ladies as minister of finance, Buhari said he did that because of the cultural belief that people would feel too big to go to them for favours.
According to him, “I made sure I gave Ministers of Finance to ladies because of the cultural behaviours of Nigerians.
“Once ladies are in charge people feel too big to go to ladies. So, I am sure things will not be the same in the Ministry of Finance where people go and start lobbying for their contract to be paid so they will feel too big to go to a lady. So I make sure a lady is in charge. That gave me a lot of peace.”
