Buhari urges African leaders to place country above self

President Muhammadu Buhari on Sunday urged African leaders to place the interests of their countries above narrow personal interests. He gave the charge while chairing the African Union (AU) Peace and Security Council (PSC) meeting at the on-going AU summit in Johannesburg, South Africa. The President noted that as the meeting of PSC focused on the situations of South Sudan and Burundi, it required the leaders to put the situations in both countries in proper context. “The people of these countries are suffering while their political leaders are bickering among themselves. “I believe that is incumbent upon us as leaders to always place the interest of our countries above narrow and personal interests. “It is therefore my expectation that at the end of this summit, the PSC will come out with a united message to call on all parties to act in the interest of their people and the entire continent,’’ Buhari charged. The Nigerian President added that the leaders must make deliberate efforts to “save the face of Africa, we must give hope to the hopeless. “The time to do so is now as we look forward on the march toward 2063 to deliver a continent that is at peace with itself, prosperous, a global partner and a democratic show case’’. Buhari noted that the continent was inundated with conflicts of diverse forms including the crises in Burkina Faso, Mali, Libya, Central Africa Republic, South Sudan, and more recently in Burundi. “As you are aware in 2013 during our 50th anniversary celebration of our union, we as African leaders committed ourselves to the objective of silencing the local guns in Africa by 2020. “With just five years remaining, the prospect of realising this objective looks doubtful,’’ Buhari noted. (NAN)