…Says Nigeria target of int’l terrorism
The pan-Yoruba socio-political organisation, Afenifere, yesterday stated that the continued delay in establishing state police in the country risks plunging Nigeria into intractable ethnic wars.
While stressing that the spate of insecurity in various parts of the country is capable of pushing citizens to resort to self-defence, the foremost Yoruba group stated the state police cannot tarry for a 60-month gestation period as proposed by the Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Olatunji Disu.
Afenifere, in an issued statement signed by its Secretary-General, Sola Ebiseni, warned that the federal government’s current fire-brigade approach to security deployment has left vast ungoverned spaces vulnerable to terrorist infiltration and cross-border criminal networks.
According to Ebiseni, in the statement, Nigeria has become what he described as a deliberate target of international terrorism for an undisguised territorial agenda.
The group further advised that the issue of current insecurity should be of national concern to all and should be tackled the same way Nigerians teamed together to fight Covid-19 and not be used as a possible object of political gain.
The statement read in part: “Let no one be deceived; Nigeria is a deliberate target of international terrorism for an undisguised territorial agenda by people to whom federating state boundaries, national sovereignty and territorial integrity have no meaning.
“The federal government should particularly note that terrorism is such a rapacious international scourge that seeking collaboration beyond borders for its equally vicious termination is not tantamount to a surrender of national sovereignty.
“For the avoidance of any doubt, it is no longer acceptable for the people who voluntarily consented to being part of the Nigerian state, in the hope that they would be better protected by the created leviathan, to now be permanently subjected to terror and apprehension by their supposed compatriots in criminal cahoots with other peoples of no nation.
Ebiseni added that “The fire-brigade deployment of federal security forces after each strike of terror is infeasible and ineffective in the protection of citizens, including particularly the farmers scattered in the huge ungoverned spaces all over the country, while such permanent engagements strip the military of the awesomeness of its invincibility.
“The unnecessary vacuum being created by the intolerable delay in ensuring state police may soon be filled by intractable ethnic wars in response to the natural instincts for self and kindred protection if no urgent and immediate action is not taken.
“Political actors are advised that the issue of current insecurity should be of national concern to all, the same way Nigerians teamed together to fight Covid-19, and not to be used as a possible object of political gain.
“While the military and other armed forces are highly commended and appreciated in their patriotic combative assaults against insurgency and terrorism, their members are, however, admonished to shun any temptation or ill-advised encouragement and recruitment for intervention in civil and democratic governance.
