Roll out more policies, initiatives to support state of emergency on security — CISLAC tells Tinubu

Executive Director of Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Center (CISLAC), Comrade Auwal Musa Ibrahim Rafisanjani, on Thursday urged President Bola Tinubu to roll out more policies and initiatives that will support the state of emergency on national security, which he declared on Wednesday.

Comrade Rafisanjani gave the charge during an exclusive chat with Nigerian Tribune, describing the state of emergency declared on national security as a step in the right direction.

He said: “I think this is the right step that the president has taken to declare state of emergency and security in Nigeria.

“It has always been a major challenge in the last two decades. The insecurity is escalating in this country in different forms, and the killing and destruction of lives and properties of Nigerians across the country by different criminals pretending to be representing different interests and entities is of great concern.

“So, for the President to have declared this, it means that he has yielded to the advise that many Nigerians have been giving him, but this declaration should not just be a mere declaration.

“It should come with more commitment, more seriousness, more policy, you know, initiative and implementation.

“For example, you need to carry out a thorough security sector reforms in the country. You need to prioritize. Security in this country, you need to ensure that the process in which you do recruitment is not contaminated by corruption, you know, nepotism.

“You need to ensure that people who deserve to be promoted and be given the necessary welfare and facilities are given. You need to make sure that you clearly define roles and responsibility. For example, now Nigerian Army have been dragged to virtually every security challenge in the country, you know, internally, this shouldn’t have been the case.

“They should have been the last resort to compliment the work that other internally security organisations supposed to be doing, but they are overwhelmed and a lot of people have been put.

“In the fields without required capacity training and equipment as well as. Facility, modern equipment and facilities that they can do this work. So what I expect Mr. President to do as he declared this set of emergency is to ensure that we set up a Committee that will fashion out thorough patriotic security sector reforms, eliminating all the barriers or the corruption, all the ineffectiveness, all the unnecessary jealousy and lack of coordination, cooperation, partnership and collaboration that have undermined the security sector in the country. If we do that, then we know that the government is really committed and serious about the set of emergency in the security sector and then also stop creating artificial crisis.

“For example, we have seen what they have done, for example, in the case of Kano, where you have what you call federal area and you deploy over 20 Policemen guarding, you know, somebody that you, you know, is this of him having been an email, which you do not have that constitutional power to do that an artificial that is an artificial crisis.

“Now we have also seen how you have barricaded and deploy police in the main opposition ruling party, main opposition political party, you know, creating chaos.

“So, you know, some people you consider to be allied there. These are problems that are not supposed to be. So we need to prioritize placing our personnel, using them effectively for governed spaces, not to be using them for people’s Aides, you know, causes that you create.

“So also equally important. In terms of the financing of the security sector, you must properly equipped the security sector at all levels, the police, the DSS, the Civil Defence, and the Nigerian Army generally, you need to give them the necessary equipment, modern facilities, modern gadgets, you know, and also motivate them, you cannot, you know, throw them to the battlefield without even allowances.

“You know, you cannot throw them to the battlefield without even allowances. You know, you cannot throw them to the battlefield without even allowances or without even giving them, you know, equipment and facilities. So you need to remove all those barriers.

“These are the steps that I think if the Mr. President, you know, is committed to addressing issues of insecurity in the country, he should do that. So that issues around the partisan issues around selective promotion and undermining the legal framework to promote some people and demote some people unfairly, this will all have to go.”

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