President Buhari Reveals The Kind Of Nigerians Involved In Pipeline Bombings

President Muhammadu Buhari has revealed that the sort of people involved in pipeline bombings are not ordinary Nigerians.

According to Buhari, the sophistication of the weapons used by the militants indicated that they were not ordinary Nigerians.

The president spoke at the Presidential Villa after his investiture as the Grand Patron of the Nigerian Academy of Engineering (NAE).

The Nation reports that the president urged the academy to advise its members not to deploy their skill in a negative way as ordinary people could not go into the sea for almost 70 kilometers to blow pipelines.

“How can ordinary Nigerians go into the deep sea almost 70 kilometers to blow installations, they are not ordinary Nigerians. So you have to talk to your members.”

He noted that 99 per cent of those that constructed the four refineries in the country were Nigerian engineers and assured that the country takes them seriously.

“Nigerian engineers are competent and cost effective. I respect you all, it takes a lot to be a competent engineers.”

The president blamed the leadership of the country for the fact that the refineries were not working and not the engineers.

Mrs. Joana Maduka who is the president of the NAE noted that in the past one year, Nigerian engineers were involved in the procurement and construction of a 600 megawatt power generating plant and a 330KV switching station, the biggest in the national grid.

She said: “Countries like China, USA, Japan, South Korea and Malaysia are examples of nations that have harnessed the benefits of their engineering academies for economic progress. Fellows of the Academy of Engineering are Engineers who have reached the peak of their careers and are invited to join”

Maduka also applauded the president for moving to fix all the infrastructural deficit in the country.

She said: “This effort is very germane to the development of our nation. For this to be done effectively and efficiently, inputs are required from all cadres of engineering disciplines.

“The physical indices of development of any country are engineering based like roads, railways, water supply, power, housing and other infrastructure. However, Nigerian Engineers are underutilized for the tasks and challenges of nation building.

“For the country to attain sustainable growth status, the Nigerian engineers need to be adequately engaged in planning, policy formulation, consultancy and construction as well as industrial processes of production and manufacturing.

“Furthermore, the fact is that Nigeria is grossly under-engineered as there are insufficient engineering professionals taking the population per capita basis. For example, in China, between 2000 and 2013, all the nine members of the Standing Committee (Ministers) of the Politburo were trained engineers.

“Currently, about half of the cabinet ministers in Singapore are engineers and in China, 70 per cent of the cabinet are engineers.”