President Buhari, penultimate Monday summoned Governor Hope Uzodinma on the escalating insecurity in Imo State. The summons came on the heels of the burning of the country home of the President-General of Ohaneze Ndigbo, Prof. George Obiozor and attack on Umuguma police station in Owerri.
Two appointees of the president – Minister of Power, Abubakar Aliyu and Chief Economic Adviser, Prof. Doyin Salami were also summoned to separately address the president on the state of the power sector and national economy respectively. The tone of the order conveyed an emergency requiring the invitees to clear issues in areas of their responsibility.
There is no information on decisions reached on the power sector and the general economy of the country. But decisions on the festering insecurity in Imo State are copiously in the public domain.
Uzodinma told State House correspondents that the president approved a fresh range of solutions including the deployment of more security personnel, arms and ammunitions to douse the rising insecurity in Imo State.
The governor seemed optimistic that kinetic approach is all required to restore peace in the state. This position however, is at variance with all we have been told especially with regard to the source of the spreading insecurity in the state. Admittedly, more security personnel, arms and ammunitions are vital to maintain law and order especially where the enemy is known and its location precise.
But that is not the exact situation with the insecurity in Imo State as opinions are largely divided regarding those responsible for the reign of terror. It is also very instructive that during his interview with State House correspondents, they confronted him with allegations of culpability of his administration in the reign of terror in the state which he denied while describing such thinking as abnormal.
At the initial stages, the public was fed with the narrative that Indigenous People of Biafra IPOB and its security arm, Eastern Security Network, ESN were the masterminds of the orgy of violence in the state.
Somewhere along the line, the story of unknown gunmen crept in even as nobody has been able to decode the precise identity of the so-called unknown gunmen. We have also heard of the Ebubeagu security outfit set-up by the government even as its membership has been embroiled in controversy. These came with complications to the security situation as blame trading reigns supreme.
A new dimension was injected into this seeming puzzle when Uzodinma told Course 30 of the National Defence College, Abuja on a study of Imo State that the causes of insecurity are “a combination of the activities of bandits and political gang-up masterminded by politicians who ruled the state in the past and refused to accept defeat from 2019 election”.
At other occasions, he blamed opposition politicians and criminal elements for the rising insecurity in the state. He capped these allegations when last December, he promised to make public, the names of those sponsoring unwarranted killings, kidnapping and all forms of insecurity in the state.
Hear him “We have gotten the bank accounts from where they have been transferring money to them and we have the evidence. When I address Imo stakeholders, I will call their names one by one”.
The atmosphere in Imo was filled with suspense and great expectation waiting for the unmasking of the brains behind the festering insecurity that has ruined the economy of the state. That day came but he failed to name the so-called masterminds. Though he acknowledged he had promised to make such names public, he would rather leave security agencies to do their work and prosecute those found culpable.
It was a day of great disappointment for the people of the state in particular and the country given the high interest the issue had generated. So many questions were raised regarding what could have brought about the volte face by the governor with suggestions that he could be playing to the gallery for inexplicable reasons.
When he claimed he would name the masterminds of the spate of insecurity in the state, did it not occur to him that he was delving into an area outside the scope of his authority? And which should precede the other, the naming of the so-called sponsors of insecurity or their arrest, investigation and prosecution?
Additionally, there has been no information on the arrest and prosecution of the alleged politicians who ruled the state in the past and have refused to accept defeat from the 2019 elections. Neither has anything been heard of the list he claimed privy to including their bank accounts.
In saner societies, the law enforcement agencies would have been made to compel Uzodinma to make public such names not only to re-assure the public but as evidence that it was not aimed at getting even with opposition politicians. Had the touted evidence been availed the security agencies, the puzzle over the unceasing insecurity in Imo would have been perfectly resolved. And Buhari would not have had cause to summon the governor.
Buhari’s summons to Uzodinma says much about the peculiarity of the lingering insecurity in the state. It also points to clear inability of the authorities to decode the texture and character of the escalating insecurity in the state. Why Imo State? Is there anything peculiar to the security situation in Imo that stands it out in the southeast zone? And why is the insecurity along with its bizarre dimensions concentrated in just a few communities in the Imo West senatorial district?
Or are we to believe the governor that Imo is in the current security mess because of events of the 2019 elections? It may well be a dimension. But there are obviously other potent angles. There is the accusation that the security situation in Imo was ab initio mishandled. And what we are witnessing, the outcome of bad decision by the government. We run the same risk if the deployment of more arms and ammunitions takes precedence over credible intelligence.
Had Buhari been availed of other angles, he would have had no need to deploy more arms and ammunitions for a job the governor claims to have credible intelligence. Or are we going to roll out the tanks against those who ruled the state in the past and have refused to accept defeat from the 2019 elections?