What Buhari must do about service chiefs, insecurity —Bode George

MOST Nigerians are deeply worried by the rising level of insecurity in the country. What do you think is responsible for the worsening security situation?

The insecurity in the country is based on the lack of employment and, of course, if there is no employment, you have no money to buy foodstuffs, especially in the typical African culture where you take care of your relations and all that. Everybody gets fatigued. The government seems it cannot reduce the rate of unemployment. These are the reasons for the insecurity in the country. If people cannot feed themselves, I don’t have and you don’t have, there can’t be peace and there is nothing that suggests things are going to change for the better. That is, it is not like we wait for another day or some weeks all will be well. It looks so lost that people are getting to that precipice of utter chaos. And for me, I think the authorities need to do something about it.

The total number of policemen we have in the country cannot cope. Since every governor is the Chief Security Officer of his state, if they now decide to have another organisation, I don’t want to call it paramilitary as it is another ball game, why do you want to object? That is the real issue. The number of policemen is absolutely inadequate and we need community policing. So, the police need extra hands they can have because their presence alone is a deterrence. The idea of the Western Nigeria Security Network (WNSN), Operation Amotekun came, which I consider novel and good, I don’t understand why somebody will now say, ‘you cannot have it.’ My preference may not be your preferred choice (Bayi ni a nse nile wa, eewo ibomi ni). We used to have that kind of local police. In fact, we had it when I was growing up and the people called them ‘constabulary’. They moved around the community; they knew who was who; they knew what was what; they knew who stayed in a particular house and who did not stay in that house. So, if they saw any strange face, they would challenge the fellow.

But the general feeling now in the country is that the worsening security problem has to do with security architecture, that we need to inject fresh blood into it, that the current service chiefs should go so that new ones can bring in new ideas, that the president should allow them to go. What is your take?

My take as a former General too is that they are there are at the pleasure of the Commander-In-Chief. It is true that it makes a lot of sense to strengthen the headship. When you stay too long in the toilet, you see different flies. And to me, everybody has his own stake, just you are wishing that they should be. I know that there is a law that once you are appointed as a service chief, you will remain there at the pleasure of the Commander-In-Chief. But that doesn’t mean you cannot strengthen up the system; that is particularly the whole responsibility because he gives them approval as the Commander-In-Chief. All the other officers are promoted. If they are not, it means they must have a problem. But, honestly, it is his prerogative to keep them or to fire them.

Is there any law that says the service chiefs can stay for a specific number of years or more even after they are due to retire from service?

It is almost more than 20 years that I left service. But all I know for service chiefs, they would remain there at the pleasure of the Commander-In-Chief. For me, those are not the real issues concerning the current state of affairs. The real issue is bread and butter for the common man; there is hunger in the land. Whether the service chiefs go or not, it doesn’t matter. What is their role in the day-to-day workings of the common Nigerian? That’s the real issue. How do you bring food to their table? How do you make sure that they get good education? How do you make sure that they are secured in their homes in the day and at night because the first responsibility of government is to protect the lives and properties of the citizens? It is the primary duty and function of the government. People become restless because they do not have employment and cannot guarantee three square meals in a day. They get agitated. And if they saw no hope that it could be better tomorrow, then they get into a frenzy, which is dangerous. And if you cannot sleep with two eyes close at night, why won’t you be agitated?

Are you saying growing poverty accounts for the kind of frightening dimension that insecurity has assumed, with bandits, insurgents, kidnappers on the prowl and making life miserable for Nigerians?

It is as a result of joblessness. Joblessness leads to restlessness, when you don’t have any hope for respite. Those people who are marauding them (the innocent people) too are coming to harass them in order to get one thing or the other from their beck and call. So, I am seriously worried that we are driving ourselves straight to the precipice. The governments have to do something in collaboration: the central government, state government and the local government. People are not feeling their impact and the situation getting worse by the day.

The leadership of the National Assembly, among other major stakeholders, have strongly advocated a shake-up in the security architecture of the country if we have to find a realistic solution to the worsening security trend…

I agree with you. You can see the American system of government. In the United States, you have the local government, state government and then you have the Federal Government. You also have state police; you have the local government police, and everybody knows the dividing line. When something is beyond the capacity of the other levels of government, the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), a federal agency, will come in.

So, there is no way with our population to have just a few hands as policemen. What is the total number of policemen in Nigeria, compared to the overall population of more than 200 million the country? How can that be effective in maintaining peace and order? So, when people conceptualised Amotekun, it means that they are going to give an added value to their operations because it’s only the police that can prosecute in the court based on the existing law in Nigeria. But if we have the akoda and the Amotekun, it is going to add value to the responsibility of keeping the peace in the land.

For example, the true federalism they are talking about now, where we need a government to have a direct impact on the people, it cannot be from Abuja. But we will still find a federal government that controls virtually everything, whereas the state and local government should have strong and immediate impact on the people. Why should all the money and other resources first go to the federal purse and they would now sit down there (Abuja) distributing the money to states and local governments? For example, what has my local government got to do with Abuja? The problem of Local Government ‘A’ definitely would be different from another local government. In the US, they call them counties, but they are local governments and have nothing to do with Washington. So, let’s devolve powers from the centre. Nigeria is too big for it to be controlled centrally. For example, under the present system, a policeman reports to a central boss. So, if the governor is giving him an order and the Inspector General of Police (IGP) gives him another order, which one is he going to listen to and obey? Is it the IGP’s order? Whereas, as you go from one state to the other, you have different problems. So, the system of central control and command cannot work. Governance is bottom up, and not up bottom.

The military way of management was introduced when the military took over. It worked for the military because it’s top to bottom; you listen to your boss and you queue up; you fall in line, otherwise you are out. For governance, the will of the people must be respected. It comes from bottom and goes up. That’s democracy. Whoever emerges as a leader doesn’t mean he is like an emperor; he is the servant-leader; he is the servant to the people. In a nutshell, where is the impact of the existing order? Everybody is looking at Abuja all the time. For what? It can’t work and it will never work.

So, what do you think we are not doing right that is responsible for the resurgence of violence, insurgency, banditry other forms of violent crimes, especially lately?

The bottom line is hunger.

But a lot of people blame the military, especially the leadership for worsening security situation, that you don’t expect a different result if you keep doing the same thing the same way?

The armed forces are not the police. There is a special section called Aid to Civil Power, which means the police cannot cope with the prevailing security situation. So, the IGP will report to the Commander-In-Chief that they cannot cope.  That’s when you will now ask the military to come out for civil power because the responsibility of the army, Navy and the Air Force is to ward off foreign intruders. If there is any form of external aggression, the army gets in to ward off the intruders. Our own training is not to do police work. Soldiers are not trained for police duties. As a soldier, you are trained to shoot and kill your enemy. But the police are not trained so. The military training is such that there is an enemy lurking somewhere and I believe if I don’t get him, he will get me.

Then, what is your position on the National Assembly›s call resolution that the service chiefs should go into retirement so that the president can inject fresh bloody into the nation’s security apparatus?

We voted for him (president). It is his own responsibility to fire or to keep them because we are not fighting a foreign war now. It is an internal issue, or what is called aid to civil power. The service chiefs cannot be the only one who are doing the fighting; they have operational commands. They have other levels. Everything is coordinated to fend off any enemies of the nation. Are we in a full-blown war against Boko Haram? So, my view on the issue that they sack the service chiefs or remove them is that the hood doesn’t make the monk. The president doesn’t act alone; they brief and tell him what they have done and are doing concerning their primary role. As I said, the president doesn’t act alone. The National Security Adviser is there, who is looking at all those things and advising the president. If they don’t get any effect, then he himself must, as the commander-In-Chief, act.

What we are saying and must ask is that the people behind these disturbances, are they Nigerians? Are they foreigners? So, when you now have the local militias, they will help you in community policing. And it will be effective because they know everybody by name and the citizens know them very well too.

What kind of change would you like to see in the security architecture of the country against the backdrop of the serious problem of insecurity across the country?

Number one, the local one that referred to as akoda, that is community policing, is very necessary. Number two, the state itself should have its own police because it will be effective, far more effective if the head of the state police knows that he is directly responsible to the governor and the government of that state, and he will be more assertive. He can hold the members solely responsible for all forms of infractions. We do not need to start going to any central place to lobby for anything. For me, the function of The Nigeria Police should be like the FBI in the US. They are there alright, but there are certain roles they don’t play in the American system because you have the county police; you have the state police who can perform effectively and efficiently in their domains and areas. But when they know that there are certain things that are beyond their jurisdiction and power, they call on the FBI.

But we copied the American system up to a point and abandoned it. That is the problem. When you go to copy, copy fully, not by a half-measure. My position, therefore, is that we are still running a military system. And it is not healthy. We are still running a military system of government, where one man is at the top and everybody else falls down. And this also affects our economy. Let all the states go and make sure that the resources within their states are in their full control and contribute an agreed percentage for sustenance and upkeep of the centre. The current system is totally dysfunctional and not working. Yes, we can no longer go to the region, but we can use it as an aggregate of states to be called the United States of Nigeria and then, whoever becomes governor, if his impact is positive in four years, will be re-elected, if otherwise, the people will vote him out of power. Let’s sit down and change the constitution; it is not working or serving any useful purpose for now. If you read the report of the 2014 National Constitutional Conference, so many things, especially issues that have continued to impede the progress and unity of the country, were addressed and decided. If they are adopted, we will kill the tension in this country. We cannot run Nigeria the way it is now. Not at all!