The Federal Government says it is \u201cpreposterous\u2019\u2019 for anyone to declare Nigeria a failed state on the basis of the country\u2019s security challenges.<\/p>\n
Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, stated this in response to a recent declaration by the Council on Foreign Affairs in the United States that \u201cNigeria is at a point of no return with all the signs of a failed nation\u2019\u2019.<\/p>\n
In an interview on Thursday with NAN in Abuja, the minister stressed that \u201cNigeria is not and cannot be a failed state\u2019\u2019.<\/p>\n
Mohammed said the declaration by the Council did not represent an official US policy.<\/p>\n
He said, \u201cThis declaration is merely the opinions of two persons, former U.S. Ambassador to Nigeria and a Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations John Campbell, and the President Emeritus of World Peace Foundation, Robert Rotberg.<\/p>\n
\u201cDeclaring any nation a failed state is not done at the whims and caprices of one or two persons, no matter their status.<\/p>\n
\u201cJust because Nigeria is facing security challenges, which we have acknowledged and which we are tackling, does not automatically make the country a failed state.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLike former US Senator Daniel Moynihan said, \u201dYou are entitled to your opinion but not your facts\u201d.<\/p>\n
Mohammed reiterated that Nigeria did not meet the criteria for a nation to become a failed state.<\/p>\n
He listed the criteria to include inability to provide public service and inability to interact with other states as a full member of the international community.<\/p>\n
\u201cYes, the non-state actors may be rampaging in some parts of the country, they have not and cannot overwhelm this government,\u2019\u2019 he said.<\/p>\n
The minister noted that it was not the first time it was predicted that Nigeria would fail or break up.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were even once told that Nigeria would break up in 2015.<\/p>\n
—NAN<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Federal Government says it is \u201cpreposterous\u2019\u2019 for anyone to declare Nigeria a failed state on the basis of the country\u2019s security challenges. Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed,…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":81536,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-81534","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n