Insecurity has again remained the burning issue this year with daily reports of kidnappings for ransom in different parts of the country. Also, so many innocent lives are being lost daily to banditry in the North while the number of casualties of a similar carnage is gradually climbing up in the South.
And as the death toll mounts, most Nigerians are feeling insecure and feel that the government at all levels has not given insecurity enough attention it deserves in a situation where it seems bandits are always a step ahead of the security agencies and the security agents are more reactive than proactive.
Because of the seeming failure of the government to address the problem squarely, citizens are left to resort to self-help and the IPOB-formed Eastern Security Network is a case in point. The prolonged state of insecurity in most parts of the country is also stoking ethnic tension amidst widespread poverty worsened by the raging Coronavirus pandemic.
The war of words between the Presidency and the Ondo State Government over the order given by the latter to unregistered herdsmen to vacate the state’s forest reserves is also not the kind of rhetoric needed when all hands must be on the deck to ensure that the burgeoning problem is tackled headlong.
With the benefit of hindsight, without a holistic strategy to seriously tackle the hydra-headed monster of banditry, things could also degenerate fast security-wise in the South. Therefore, one of the biggest challenges to the unity and territorial integrity of this country today, we dare to say, is insecurity, and government at all levels should not be fiddling while Rome burns.
It is high time the Federal Government, especially the Legislative and The Executive arms and states sat together to find both constitutional and commonsense solutions to security challenges which are ill winds that will blow nobody any good. Government functionaries should, in seeking to pull Nigeria out of the security quagmire, look at decisions that will eventually put an end to incessant bloodletting and brigandage nationwide.
In cases where perpetrators of crimes are identified, they should face the music and not given any preferential treatment whatsoever. The love for Nigeria should transcend all ethnic cleavages and primordial considerations. A country dies when citizens lose a sense of belonging and a sense of being protected by the government and a state of anomy is unleashed by criminals and gangsters.
Therefore, we call unequivocally for a national security conference to be attended by all key government functionaries at the state and local government levels where holistic and actionable solutions will be found to the security challenges facing the country. Already, the hues and cries over insecurity are getting louder in all parts of the country and the time to act is now.