Presidential Villa roundup for Feb. 25 to March 3, 2018

On Monday, Feb. 26, 2018, President Buhari met three lecturers of the University of Maiduguri and 10 women who were released by Boko Haram insurgents more than two weeks ago.

While thanking the security agencies and all those who facilitated the release, the President said his administration would ensure that all persons abducted by the insurgents are rescued or released safely.

Later on Monday night, the President attended the All Progressives Congress (APC) national caucus meeting held at the Presidential Villa.

The President advised the leadership of the party to avoid “illegal manoeuvres” in picking the party’s candidates at all levels for the 2019 elections.

On Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2018, President Buhari attended the APC National Executive Committee (NEC) meeting at the party’s headquarters in Abuja.

At the NEC, the President told the party faithful that the stand-off between the Executive and the National Assembly had slowed the process of government, promising to work hard to resolve the differences so that the country can move forward.

The President, in a statement, on behalf of the Federal Executive Council and all Nigerians, congratulated the Nigerian Labour Congress (NLC) on its 40th anniversary, assuring Nigerian workers that his administration will always work towards an inclusive economy that adequately caters for workers and their families, which has started with the ongoing review of the minimum wage.

On Wednesday, Feb. 28, 2018, President Buhari attended the High Level Meeting of the international conference on Lake Chad at Transcorp Hilton Hotel Abuja.

The high-level meeting was attended by leaders of Niger, Chad, Gabon, Central African Republic and the Prime Minister of Cameroon.

At the meeting, the President renewed his appeal on the international community to support the revival of the Lake Chad to the benefit of all member countries of the Lake Chad Basin Countries (LCBC) and to the ecological balance of a large area of West Africa.

Earlier in a statement issued on Wednesday, the President was said to have approved the re-appointment of Mr Olusegun Awolowo as Executive Director/Chief Executive Officer of the Nigerian Export Promotion Council (NEPC) for another four-year term in office.

On Thursday March 1, 2018, President Buhari received the Letters of Credence from Shirley Ho Vicario, Ambassador of Republic of the Philippines to Nigeria, Nelson Ocheger, High Commissioner of Uganda to Nigeria and Lim Sim Seng, Non-Resident High Commissioner of Republic of Singapore to Nigeria.

During his audience with the High Commissioner of Singapore, the President said Nigeria was committed to attaining self-sufficiency in food production and consumption, while radically cutting down on imports of agricultural products that depleted the country’s foreign reserve in the past.

Later on Thursday, the President received a business delegation from Qatar led by the former Emir, Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al-Thani at the State House, Abuja.

He told the delegation that he is pleased with the rise in foreign private investments in the country owing to the success of his administration’s economic agenda.

The President described the Federal Government’s economic agenda as one designed to move the country from over-reliance on crude oil and food importation, noting that the policy has in the past two years turned Nigeria into one of the most attractive investment destinations in Africa.

March 2, 2018 saw the President preside over a meeting on the Presidential Fertilizer Initiative (PFI) at the council chambers of the State House, Abuja.

The meeting was attended by Government officials and the private sector including investors, senior executives of fertilizer companies and financial institutions.

The President told the stakeholders in the PFI to ensure that quality fertiliser are readily available and obtainable by Nigerian farmers, and work together to ensure that Nigeria never returns to the dark days of import dependence.

Later, the President met with the new President of the ECOWAS Commission, Mr Jean Claude Brou at the State House, Abuja and used the occasion of the meeting to call on member states of the organisation to pay their annual contributions regularly.

The President added that ECOWAS must run a leaner and smarter organisation by cutting costs and becoming more efficient to achieve the objectives of the sub-regional body.

In the aftermath of Boko Haram insurgents attack on Rann, a community in Borno State, on March 1, 2018, which according to the UN Security Council led to the death of at least three humanitarian workers, four Nigerian Government Army personnel, four Nigerian Mobile Police personnel and injury to others, President Buhari issued a strongly worded statement calling the attack on humanitarian workers by Boko Haram insurgents, ‘‘godless, despicable, brutish and utterly to be despised.’’

Sympathizing with the United Nations and other humanitarian agencies working at Rann, and in the country generally, the President said such cowardly attacks can only bolster the determination of government to bring the Boko Haram insurgency to a decisive end, in the shortest possible time.

On Saturday, March 3, 2018, President Buhari flew to Kano to grace the wedding fatiha of Fateema Ganduje, the daughter of Kano State Governor, Umar Ganduje and Idris Abolaji Ajimobi, the son of Oyo State Governor, Abiola Ajimobi.

The wedding Faitha took place at the Kano Central Mosque (Emir’s Palace).