Amotekun: Southwest is in order

By Idris Mohammed

Sir: The establishment of regional security network in the Southwest continues to pour reactions from different places and background.  The recent comment was that of the Minister of Justice who described the outfit as unconstitutional and illegal to operate, as according to him, no any state whether singly or in a group has the legal right and competence to establish any form of organization or agency for the defense of Nigeria or any of its constituent parts.

From the word of the chairman Nigerian Governors Forum and Governor of Ekiti state: “Amotekun is complement that will give our people confidence that they are being looked after those they elected into office.

So, we do not want this to create fear in the mind of anybody, as we are not creating a regional police force, and are fully aware of the steps we must take to have the state police. We do not want anybody to misconstrue the concept of Amotekun.

It was in the context of the unfortunate development that we lost the daughter of Pa Rueben Fasoranti, the leader of Afenifere. And that further put pressure on us, as leaders in the Southwest, to do something about insecurity”.

The above clarification summarized the rationale behind the security structure in the region; the insecurity issues that culminated into operation Amotekun bordered on the rampant kidnapping, banditry and armed robbery cases in many states in the Southwest.

Yorubas are good students of the insecurity in the North; they carefully observed how the insurgency destroyed the socio-economic development of Northeast and how the deadly transnational bandits are operating in the Northwest.

So, they don’t want their region to fall into same trap, which is what prompted them to proactively plan ahead of any hidden plan or agenda by the so-called transnational bandits.

To be fair to the Yorubaland, Nigeria is in the unpredictable era where the official security architecture has failed woefully to secure the lives and properties of Nigerians.

Take example of what going on in the Northwest where highly trained and professional transnational bandits are sacking communities, killing people and destroying farmlands and even as the region has failed to figure out the solution to the issue.

In the Northeast, the Boko Haram/ISWAP terrorist groups are killing people every day and causing a lot of humanitarian crisis while North-central is battling with farmer/herders’ clashes that are consuming communities every day.

In a nutshell, Northern Nigeria is confronting serious internal security challenges ranging from kidnapping, armed banditry, cattle rustling and clashes between farmers and herders.

Read Also: More knocks for AGF Malami over Operation Amotekun

No one would have seen or heard any Amotekun if the Nigeria security agencies are doing the necessary and needful. It is not right to condemn Southwest for designing what they believe will solve the insecurity challenges in their communities; it is equally, not right to compare the Hisbah which is more of a religious group working to bring morality among the Muslim communities.

There is no law backing the existence of the Hisbah in some northern states; the group is not established to provide security in the communities. Also, people comparing Amotekun with Civilian JTF in the Northeast forget that almost each region has it vigilante group.

Those afraid of Amotekun, may be doing so because the country has for long been divided among ethnic lines. To them, Amotekun may have been established to fight the settlers especially Fulani herdsmen that are always at the loggerheads with some of the communities especially in Ekiti, Ondo and Oyo states.

Whatever the case might be, Amotekun as the security architecture should not bear arms in any form since it is not officially recognized by law.

Southwest governors should also sensitize people more on their intentions in order to curb the fear in the mind of public. Amotekun should be well trained and guided to address the insecurity issues assigned to them not being tools for politicians to harass their opponents.

Another considerations is rampant human right abuse mostly common among the vigilante groups since they are not professionally trained.

• Idris Mohammed, Sokoto.