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Killings are still taking place in annoying numbers in hotspots across the country. For these peddlers of evil, who take delight in killing innocent Nigerians, it’s as if no change of baton has taken place in Aso Villa. We get impressions such as, if Muhammadu Buhari, a retired General of the Nigerian Army could not tame them, who will?
After the May 29 inauguration of President Bola Tinubu, we read that terrorists are intensifying attacks to get noticed. We’re told that bandits are trying to force new governors to negotiate fresh peace deals in the Northwest.
In three weeks, Zamfara was their first port of call. They killed 21 residents in Janbako, a community in Maradun, mostly local vigilante members; three were killed in Sakikida. Over 30 women and girls were abducted in Gora same day, but were later released. In Tangaza area of Sokoto State, 37 people were reportedly killed in Raka, RakarDutse, Bilingawa and other communities in nearby Gwadabawa. Abductions along Shinkafi-KauraNamoda road, and Zurmi-KauraNamoda road among others, we are told have increased.
The former governor of Zamfara State, Bello Matawalle did his best to contain terrorists who have dealt terribly with local communities during his four-year administration. Zamfara is lucky to have gold deposit in its territory, making it vulnerable to all manner of criminal activities, including rogue exploitation of the resource. Matawalle reportedly made peace deals where possible and paid peace taxes on behalf of citizens to pacify the marauders. It now appears the peace deals have expired.
Gunmen have also not stopped their genocidal activities in the Plateau, where they invade communities unchallenged, killing scores, and burning their homes and farms. Penultimate Sunday, they killed a pastor at the Church of Christ in Nations (COCIN), identified as Nicodemus Kim and 20 others in Ryom and Barkin Ladi Local Government Areas. The pastor was killed in Gana-Rapp, while others were murdered in Rim, Jol and Kwi communities, as confirmed by the National Publicity Secretary of the Berom Youth Movement (BYM, Rwang Tengwong.
At the weekend, students of Federal University, Gusau, blocked the Zaria-Sokoto highway in protest against abduction of their colleagues by bandits. It shouldn’t be allowed to go beyond that, especially as economic reforms are unfolding. Without quality security in place, all of these exertions will come to naught.
Killings are ongoing and President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has a unique opportunity to redeem his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), after telling Nigerians about their capacity to fight insecurity. Before they came on board in 2015, insurgency was localized in the Northeast and they made political capital of it, with a promise to end it all in six months.
Today, insurgency has taken root in the Northwest and Northcentral. The Northeast remains a cauldron, burning and consuming men and resources. We heard of the beheading of seven farmers last Thursday by Boko Haram terrorists. The farmers were working on a farm in Molai, about five kilometers from Maiduguri when they were waylaid, as confirmed by a former commissioner for youths and sports, Sainna Buba. So sad!
Shortly before he left office, former President Buhari said his government spent over one billion dollars to retrieve territories in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states that were held by the insurgents. He made this revelation on January 17, 2023 at the African Conference for Peace in Mauritania. I think he picked an award at that ceremony.
And this is where President Tinubu should begin his own war against banditry and terrorism. He should first do a comprehensive audit of the defence and security sector in the last eight years. Nigerians need to know how much was allocated to defence in each of the eight years, actual releases and overall expenditure.
Terrorists
Let the President take note that apart from the one billion dollars Buhari spent to retrieve just two-thirds of Borno State, half of Yobe State and a couple of local governments in Adamawa State from Boko Haram, defence allocations since 2015 have climbed to trillions, from the modest N98 billion in 2015 to N2.98 trillion in 2023.Tinubu, an accounting wizard should be interested in the details. It will help in managing resources to fight the war.
Now, we are getting wiser and realising that it was foolishness to have believed that under Buhari, nobody could steal shishi. Just three weeks of his absence has exposed enough. President Tinubu should do more to recover what was stolen from the people and win back their trust. He was a central figure in the coalition that brought the APC to power. All that they promised the people they flunked spectacularly. Now, he is the central figure to restore all that were damaged.
When Buhari came on board in 2015, his first target was the Office of National Security Adviser (NSA), where Col. Sambo Dasuki (rtd) once managed the affairs on behalf of former president Jonathan. Dasuki was locked up for four years to enable a thorough investigation of how funds meant for national security were misapplied. Rather than focus on dealing with security matters, monies were disbursed to loyalists of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as campaign funds.
A lot of politicians returned monies that they got from that office; with many not utilising their share for the purpose they were instructed, which was to prosecute the 2015 elections. Many were supposedly strong supporters of Jonathan, but they took the money home and allowed the man lose the election. Buhari smoked them out and recovered a lot of money, details of which were not disclosed, yet that was a good outing and citizens expect more of such from Tinubu.
Security vote, which is pocket money to some governors, does not come under any form of scrutiny or accountability checks. It is some kind of slush fund for governors to spend in whatever way they fancy. That is how defence budgets are also restricted from the prying eyes and the office of the NSA could warehouse such for serious covert exercises or as cover for unaccounted disbursements.
Under Buhari, it seemed that the Commander-in-Chief closed his eyes to allegations of misuse of defence budgets by his Service Chiefs. He didn’t pay enough attention to leaks leading to rumours in the media; he never ordered any investigation. It seemed he pampered the top brass whom he put above scrutiny and when there were stories of snake farms; expensive apartments in Dubai and elsewhere, nothing happened.
Even the crippling effect of crude oil theft, to which military chiefs were no exempt, a crime bordering on economic sabotage and grave insecurity, did little to awaken a languid Presidency. Instead, the security chiefs were offered tenure elongation and more political patronages when they were eventually sent forth.
Apart from battlefield reports, which were not encouraging, there were back-channel leaks of conspiracies among the President’s kitchen team that hampered delivery. In the first four years of the Buhari Presidency, there was noticeable rancor among the top command echelon. The one who was and is still NSA, Mohammed Babagana Monguno, a retired general was reported not to enjoy requisite trust form the Service Chiefs.
A poor coordination of operations at the highest level of any theatre command could only resort in blunders in the warfront. That was evident before the COVID-19 episode set in. After that, there seemed to be a little coherence as the interference was no more. But largely, conflict of interests characterized the security sector under Buhari.
President Tinubu must therefore be mindful of what constitutes national security apart from regime security. The latter, if elevated above the former constrains the mind of a leader not to cast his net farther afield to incorporate other crucial interests.
Ribadu
The major limitation with Buhari’s security architecture was that he saw himself as a tribal chief whose longevity deserved more attention than whatever else happened in the country. That reflected in his security appointments, the aggregate of which left the vast majority of citizens unprotected. His body language was very clear and the high commands of the Police and the Military delivered to that narrow specification.
In appointing his Service Chiefs, President Tinubu should consider a balancing that wouldn’t leave any segment with a sense of losing out of the equation, not as mere token of political correctness but one of genuine desire to build trust and togetherness. On no account should any group be allowed to assume it is more entitled or valued than others.
When President Obasanjo returned in 1999, he systematically freed the armed forces from hegemonic control; he defused and diffused the levers of military superintendence to reduce the sense of domination and oppression, superiority and inferiority. Sense of ownership of the forces should be nationalised to avoid situations whereby marauders invade communities to maim and kill while security operatives look the other way. That should no longer be tolerated. All lives of Nigerians matter.
Finally, a response from the Presidency to security breaches should be swift and impactful. Now that a government is in place, those who speak on behalf of government should get sober and civil. In its latest report, Amnesty International lamented that killings are still going on in Nigeria, urging the new administration to do something. The organisation claimed that more than 120 people have been killed since President Tinubu was inaugurated as President on May 29.
A spokesperson of the government and the APC chose to lambast the organisation, telling it to shut up. That’s not the civilised way to go!
