Two former military top brass have supported the recall of retired military officers to help stem the alarming security challenges facing the country. They are Gen. Martin Luther Agwai (rtd.) and Admiral Ola Sa’ad Ibrahim (rtd.), both former Chiefs of Defence Staff (CDS).
They both spoke at a seminar in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), at the post-career awareness and retirement dinner of the 36 Regular Course of the Nigerian Defence Academy, that entered Nigeria’s military service in 1984 but which bulk, according to the set’s president, Brig-Gen. Mustapha Onoiveta, retired “six months ago.”
Earlier, both Gen. Lucky Irabor, sitting CDS and Lt-Gen. Farouk Yahaya, Chief of Army staff (COAS), had at several meetings with retired military officers, technically referred to as military reservists, told them to gird their loins for possible recall to come help to confront, with their career experiences, Nigeria’s current security challenges.
Agwai reinforced that call. He told the Course 36 retirees: “While it is practically impossible to address all foreseeable security challenges, you have a duty to continue to proffer solutions and suggestions towards tackling the security challenges facing the nation. This is because the nation has invested a lot of money in making you what you are today.” True.
Ibrahim weighed in thus: “As retired military officers, you are trained to be focused, disciplined and decisive. These attributes,” he insisted, “will be required anytime the nation has a need. So, you should be prepared to deploy your knowledge in the collective search to contain national security challenges.”
Call these twin-pitches an ode to the reservists creed and you won’t be entirely wrong. The reservists concept, valid in armed forces traditions all over the world, can hardly be invalid in Nigeria. You could therefore say the recall is a patriotic call, well grafted in global and noble military traditions and conventions.
Still, the so-called “Nigerian factor” casts some dark spell and doubtful shadows on this otherwise patriotic call. Many of the brood being toasted as probable security messiahs today, yesterday had controversial exits from their tours of duty. The question is: what has changed to make them new toasts?
The point must, therefore, be clearly made: inasmuch as recalling reservists is a noble idea, particularly amidst national security woes, those to be involved should be only those retired with unblemished records. Anything short would be unhelpful.
But even with best of intentions and recall of the finest of retired military minds, there is still a grave limitation. The current security near-meltdown isn’t entirely due to incompetence of serving security personnel: indeed, many serving folks have time and time again displayed brilliance, bravery and rare illuminating patriotism when called upon.
The snag is that even the best in the military and other security agencies are limited and gravely constrained by the extant system. By not federalising security, there is limitation to how effective serving personnel could function, no matter their individual brilliance and ardour of commitment.
So, the first basic thing to do — we must repeat, for the umpteenth time — is to federalise the Police. Urgent steps must be taken to legalise state police. What this does immediately is to greatly increase the numbers of legal and legitimate deterrent forces against felons running wild and uncontrolled across Nigeria’s wide terrain and forests.
When state police is formalised, then reservists and others could be deployed to train new recruits in basic drills to tackle wild felons, and in intelligence skills to smoke them out even before they cause havoc.
So, even as the new policing system settles down in enhanced training in basic arms and heightened rigours in personnel training, the intelligence arms could take-off harvesting intel from the remotest of Nigerian forests and rural outposts. That would have the effect of preempting terrorists hibernating in these outposts.
The path to follow if we are to fix the present system, which has all but failed, is to move away from the arid and present unitary security framework.