TheCable

President Muhammadu Buhari says the international community must devise strategies and mobilise effort to stop the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq (ISIS) from infiltrating the Lake Chad Basin.

Some of the countries in the basin are Nigeria, Niger and Chad, where Boko Haram and its affiliates are a threat.

Addressing world leaders at the 72nd session of the UN General Assembly in New York on Tuesday, the president said the frontiers of democracy, good governance and rule of law were expanding in Africa.

Buhari, who was the eighth speaker at the event,  called for concerted effort to deal with the infiltration of ISIS into the region.

He also said the international community must be “mindful and focus on the widening inequalities within societies, and the gap between the rich and the poor nations”.

The president said these inequalities and gaps were part of the underlining root causes of competition for resources, frustration and anger leading to spiralling instability.

“The frontiers of good governance, democracy including holding free and fair elections, and enthronement of the rule of law are expanding everywhere, especially in Africa,” he said.

“Our faith in democracy remains firm and unshaken. Our regional organisation ECOWAS came together to uphold democratic principles in The Gambia – as we had done previously in Cote D’Ivoire.

“Through our individual national efforts, state institutions are being strengthened to promote accountability, and to combat corruption and asset recovery.  These can only be achieved through the international community cooperating and providing critical assistance and material support.  We shall also cooperate in addressing the growing transnational crimes such as forced labour, modern day slavery, human trafficking and cybercrime.

“These cooperative efforts should be sustained. We must collectively devise strategies and mobilise the required responses to stop fleeing ISIS fighters from mutating and infiltrating into the Sahel and the Lake Chad Basin, where there are insufficient resources and response capacity is weak.”