Former President Olusegun has fired an open letter to the President Muhammadu Buhari on the army killing of protesters at Lekki Toll gate, Lagos.
Obasanjo urged the President to engage the youths and stave off crisis in the country.
The letter was titled ‘statement on violence against protesters in Nigeria: An appeal for calm.’
In his view, President Buhari bede to act and act fast before it was too late.
Buhari had remained largely silent since the #EndSARS protests across the land were infiltrated by hoodlums who drifted the largely protests into clashes with security operatives.
The former president accused Buhari and the military of not exhausting all options before they used force against the protesters, stressing that the demands by the youths were not unreasonable.
“Great harm has been done, but it can be stopped before it completely spirals out of control, ” Obasanjo said.
The Otta farmer, who had authored several searing letters to Buhari, in which he depicted the incumbent president as incompetent, parochial and pandering to primordial sentiments of ethnicity, urged Buhari to withdraw soldiers from streets and engage protesters in dialogues.
While blaming the President for the murder of the protesters at Lekki and other parts of the country, Obasanjo said the shooting of unarmed protesters had never been effective in suppressing public anger.
He also said, “Most of the demands of the protesting youth, which Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State swiftly took to the President, are not unreasonable and can be met without anyone’s political interest or ambition being threatened.”
Obasanjo also advised the youth to eschew violence , advising them to give peace a chance and stop destruction of public property and targeting individuals.
Several Nigerians including Senators have express surprise at the level of reaction from the presidency to the crisis that has engulfed the country.
Some are shocked that the Federal Executive Council held on Wednesday with any official statement from the President on the dark development in the country.
