When Bola Ahmed Tinubu was inaugurated as the President of the Federal Republic Nigeria and Commander-in-Chief of its Armed Forces on May 29, 2023, he promised he would adopt a new "doctrine" and "architecture" in tackling our security challenges which beat his predecessor, Muhammadu Buhari, hands down.
He thereby raised the hopes of many concerned Nigerians, perhaps in line with his campaign mantra: "Renewed Hope". A new approach was what people clamoured for, and Buhari refused to budge until 2021 when new Service Chiefs were sworn-in and they fairly halted terrorists, bandits and hoodlums from overwhelming the country.
Tinubu has already appointed battle-tested military and Police Chiefs. His manner of selecting them was well-received because he restored inclusion. He has put all hands back on deck unlike Buhari whose overloading of the commanding heights of our security forces with officers predominantly from his part of the country predisposed our security system to failure.
However, Tinubu has made other moves which the public are yet to be apprised of their objectives. For instance, ex-Niger Delta militant, Dokubo Asari, visited the President and boasted, right there in Aso Villa, that "the Federal Government" awarded him contract to perform security operations in Anambra, Imo, Abia, Rivers and several parts of the North. He claimed responsibility for the relative calm in some parts of the North, while accusing the Army and Navy of perpetrating oil theft in the Niger Delta.
If indeed the Tinubu government has given Asari security contract to do the work of our Armed Forces and Police, is this what the President means by new "doctrine" and "architecture"? We need explanations because we doubt that this strategy will augur well for Nigeria in the long run, as the Sudan experience has shown.
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Also, controversial Senator and former governor of Zamfara State, Ahmed Sani Yerima, last Monday spoke to State House media corps after a meeting with the President. He claimed that Tinubu had mandated him to help find solution to the banditry in Zamfara which is the epicentre in the North-West. The riots which Yerima's Sharia law sparked claimed 1,295 lives in Kaduna alone in 2000.
As if to show he really had little to offer in the assignment, Yerima called for dialogue with, and amnesty for, the bandits! Former governors, Bello Matawalle(Zamfara) and Bello Masari(Katsina), initiated several dialogues and amnesty offers. Indeed, a notorious, wanted bandit leader, Adamu Aleru, was even turbaned as Sarkin Fulani of Yandoto Emirate by Emir Garba Marafa in July 2022. None of these made any difference because bandits are criminals.
We must be careful in our dealings with known violent elements. There is no substitute to the use of our armed forces, police, security agencies, courts and correctional institutions to restore and maintain law and order
