The attention of the public has been drawn to the widely publicized sectoral debate with the service chiefs of the federation over the lingering issue of insecurity across the country.
The debate which was organized by the House of Representative as part of ways towards finding a lasting solution to problems of insecurity in the country is a welcome idea, even though security matters are not necessarily for public debate/consumption.
However, Kudos is given to the organizers and participants at the sectoral debate, at least for efforts of finding a solution to issue of security menace.
It is the hope of the public that the outcome of the exercise will be effectively channeled towards achieving the desired results.
I wish to observe and caution that issue of security, when tabled for discussion must be done with caution, unbiased facts and objectively, as politicizing it for whatever reason will not yield the desired positive results.
In my opinion, the recently held sectoral debate was an avenue for the heads of each participating security outfit to provide excuses to defend their various agencies and absolve the agencies of blame for the deteriorating security situation in the country.
It is an obvious fact that security departments or para-military sectors that were not opportune to be present at the recent security debate exercise, were those singled out for blame. While sectors like the army, navy, the police and Airforce that were represented were absolved of any direct blame.
This is why I sympathize with the department of Nigerian Correctional Centre (Prisons) which officials(warders) were singled out for blame over the unending activities of terrorists and Boko Haram groups in Nigeria.
To be specific, the Chief of Defence Staff blamed the prison warders for being responsible for the continued operations of Boko Haram because they allow Boko Haram elements detained in their facilities across the country to carry out their plans and sponsorship of such plans while in detention in our prisons. He stressed that it is with the knowledge and aid of prison warders whom the detained Boko Haram elements paid to use their bank accounts to transfer funds for the execution of their activities.
I beg to disagree with this assertion or selective apportioning of blame. In my long experience in security matters, no particular security or para-military outfit can be singled out for being responsible for the yet to be resolved issue of insecurity in Nigeria.
While I am not totally dismissing the allegation of compromise on the part of prison warders as unfounded, I wish to mention that there is no security outfit that is free of bad eggs within its formation.
For instance, there were allegations in the past instances, where commanders’ troop leaders on operation leak (sell) information to boko haram, ending in the ambush/killings of Nigerian soldiers, or have we not heard of moles among the Nigerian soldiers?
The same goes for the Nigerian Police Force, where there are cases of some police officers selling the identity of informants to culprits or convicts.
The public was informed on several occasion by the security chiefs that they know the sponsors of Bokoharam/Terrorists but yet failed to disclose them or make their arrest. Is it not funny that sector heads that participated in the sectoral debate, instead of accepting weakness or failure in clamping down on insecurity decided to shift the blame to paramilitary outfits such as Nigerian Correctional Centres, as being responsible for their failures, while also turning around to complain of underfunding or inadequate budget allocation to their various sectors.
One would have expected the Chief of Defence Staff who said that some Boko Haram elements in North-East revealed to him the compromising activities of some warders across Nigeria’s Correctional Centres, to have swiftly set up machinery to investigate the matter in order to halt the trend instead of coming to make public such allegation.
One would also recall series of attacks on Nigerian Correctional Centres e.g. Kuje Prison by terrorist groups and Boko Haram, yet the attackers passed through security checkpoints, Police/Military to carry out the attacks on the prisons.
In essence, if the truth must be said, it is high time our security outfits stopped chasing shadows and buck passing.
Ahmed S. Adoke is Managing Director,Duniya Agencies Nig. Ltd. He writes from Km8, Okene-Lokoja Road, Nagazi Uvete, Adavi LGA, Kogi State.
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