President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan Monday in Kaduna commissioned the Defence Industry Corporation of Nigeria (DICON) bullet proof vest production factory.
The President commended the Public Private Partnership (PPP) between DICON and MAROM-DOLPHIN Nigeria Limited which resulted in the domestic production of the bullet proof vests and other textile wares for the Nigerian Armed Forces and other security agencies in the country.
President Jonathan noted that the landmark event further signaled that the “nation’s military establishment has effectively keyed into the Federal Government’s Local Content Policy which is aimed at building indigenous capacity in the petroleum and other sectors of the national economy.”
The President restated his Administration’s commitment “to creating the requisite enabling environment for local manufacturing industries to grow, become major employers of labour and progressively become globally competitive.”
President Jonathan noted that the Nigerian Navy’s locally designed and constructed Seaward Defence Boat which he commissioned about a month ago in Lagos and the Armoured Personnel Carriers (APCs) locally produced by the Nigerian Army Engineering Corps which he also commissioned Monday at the Command and Staff College, Jaji, Kaduna as part of activities marking the 2012 Nigerian Army Day Celebrations (NADCEL), marked the beginning of the end of the nation’s total reliance on foreign suppliers for the country’s security needs.
While urging all Nigerians to show patriotism by buying DICON products, President Jonathan indicated that a directive would soon be issued to compel all Federal agencies to patrionise DICON unless they can prove convincingly that such products are not available locally.
“That is the only way we can move as a nation,” he said, while calling on other foreign investors to emulate MAROM-DOLPHIN.
President Jonathan accompanied by the governors of Kaduna and Bayelsa States, ministers, members of the National Assembly and the Chief of Defence Staff among other top government officials, also inspected weapons made by DICON-MAROM.
DICON was established by an Act of Parliament in 1964 to primarily “produce small arms and ammunitions for the use of the Nigerian Army, paramilitary and security agencies in the country.”
