FOR enhanced national security, social justice and economic development, corruption and indiscipline must be fought to a standstill, Niger State Governor Babangida Aliyu said yesterday.
Aliyu spoke at a public lecture organised by the Obafemi Awolowo Institute of Government and Public Policy.
The event was held at the MUSON Centre, Onikan, Lagos.
According to him, the mere physical protections or strategies that reinforce fear and isolation are cosmetics that cannot secure the country.
He said national security effort should reflect the economic transformation agenda of government and backed with effective leadership.
He traced the emergence of militant groups–Boko Haram, Bakassi Boys and Oodua Peoples’ Congress (OPC) among others to inequities, poverty and failure of a proper appreciation of what constitutes national security. He described the nation’s foreign policy as a “father Christmas” approach.
The governor said: “We need to move away from our Father Christmas foreign policy posture of the past and embrace economic diplomacy and political reciprocity within the context of the new international order. “
Those who attended the event were Ekiti State Governor Dr. Kayode Fayemi, Niger Assembly Speaker, the Institute’s Board of Trustees Chairman, Chief Bisi Akande, first female Federal Permanent Secretary, Mrs. Yetunde Emmanuel, Director, Institute of African Studies, University of Ibadan, Prof. I.O. Albert and International Relations lecturer at the Obafemi Awolowo University, Dr. Charles Ukeje.
In his lecture entitled: “The search for national security: Challenges and prospect,”, Aliyu said the country should be more sophisticated in managing its security challenges rather than handling the issues in reactionary ways or adopting impulsive measures and strategies that fail to address the fundamental problems on a sustainable basis.
He said the country can only enhance its national security if internal security challenges are handled effectively by fighting poverty, reducing unemployment, eradicating corruption and through effective leadership.
Calling for a comprehensive economic plan to address endemic poverty in the land, he said there was also the need to institutionalise policies and programmes that foster national integration and citizenship. He said Nigerians should find a home wherever they live and enjoy full rights and privileges of citizenship without discrimination.
Aliyu said: “We need to have pro-poor policies that address the fundamental social problems directly affecting the people. There must be free education at all levels, free healthcare services agricultural subsidies and abolition of food importation to boost local food production, affordable housing for all citizens, good roads, stable electricity to boost businesses, among others.
“Nigeria is not being made more secured merely by anti-bomb or anti-terrorist barriers or by subjecting the people to checks that curtail their freedoms or violate their fundamental rights. Neither are we made more secure by curtailing movement of visitors, investors, lawful migrants or creating too many check points in different parts of our country.
“Why do we think some nations like China, Japan, India and the European countries are stable and flourishing, despite their huge population and challenges? It is because they can feed their population and at the same time grow their economy to foster their national security.
“Nigeria can also do the same. Let there be food on the table of every Nigerian first and foremost, to reduce the tension and scrambling across the nation.
“Perhaps, the greatest impediment to national security in Nigeria today remains corruption which creates an unending vicious circle of poverty, deprivation, greed, exploitation, unemployment and general underdevelopment, thereby weakening the capacity of government to provide social and ultimately undermining national security.
“In the same vein, elite fragmentation poses a serious challenge to national security because of the inordinate ambitions and competition within the elite. They are unfortunately engaged in endless competition and the pursuit of narrow selfish interests at the expense of national unity and integration.”
The governor who decried the lack of equipment for the security agencies to function optimally, noted that the country has not been able to meet the minimum standard of adequate security as the current ratio is one police officer to 431 Nigerians; one army to 1, 270; an air force officer to 11, 000; a Navy to 9, 167 and one civil defence officer to 3, 200 Nigerians.
Clarifying Northern governors’ position on state police, Aliyu said what the Northern State Governors Forum called for was a debate to help clarify the issues surrounding it especially with the peculiarities of the Nigerian state.
Fayemi ,who chaired the occasion said there can be no concept of national security if the security of the individual is not placed at the centre. He said it was in the drive to ensure the security of lives and properties of the people that made some states to advocate for state police.
Although, the Constitution allows for military’s collaboration with civil authorities in matters of internal security, Fayemi said it is a judgement call because the more the military is called upon to intervene in such matters, the more the civilian government makes the military believes it is incompetent.
He said: “We have dominant of security issues to deal with, yet we have not demonstrated the capacity to do so.
“If the safety and security of our people is the defining principle of policy, then the people must be carried along.
“Do we have a consensus? Do we have a shared vision of this entity called Nigeria? Are we citizens or subjects? Do we have ownership? We need to return to the brass stand to get a sense of this place called Nigeria.
“The states no longer possess the monopoly of the management of violence that is why we have so many security challenges. We have reached a level where the legitimacy and accountability of every security apparatus have been let loose through privatisation of violence.
“For us to get it right, our defence, economic and foreign policy must be in tandem just as Governor Aliyu said and they must be driven by respect for the citizens.
“Poverty itself is not the problem we are confronting in Nigeria but the inequality it breeds. Private jets are parked all over the tarmac when we cannot even run a national airline. We must set a pathway for the youths to look up to.”
In his opening remarks, Chief Bisi Akande, who is the National Chairman of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), said the country continues to score close to zero in every positive dimension of human development irrespective of its abundant natural and human resources. He was represented by Mrs. Emmanuel.
The ACN national chair said: “The point of course is that we have not suffered from a lack of insightful voices with regards to how we can better secure our nation and people, but the lack of political will on the part of the dominant factions of the elites over time or a criminal tendency of the same elite to generate and feed fat on the conditions that lead to instability.
“It seems the elite prefer to cut their noses to spite their faces. They sacrifice strategic interests for transient, tactical gains. No wonder the Nigerian people have become more trenchant in their prayers to God to save them from their leaders.
