Sack These Incompetent Security Chiefs Now!

By Tayo Demola

For several months now, some parts of the nation have been boiling with hostilities. We have since lost count of the number of killings that have taken place. We have lost count of the number of innocent Nigerians that have been killed in one of the most dastard and mindless killings in the history of Nigeria. I can’t believe that this is happening before our own very eyes and nothing has been done about these killings up till now!

President Buhari and Service Chiefs

It seems as if the government has now accepted this as the norm because I’m yet to see any drastic step taken by the President to address these urgent issues and put a permanent stop to these security challenges.  President Muhammadu Buhari should realise that the primary responsibility of government is to protect lives and property and to care for the welfare of the people. The government has failed to provide these for the people.

The government has failed to protect the people of Nigeria.

It now seems as if there is no government in Nigeria.

It now seems as if the people of Nigerian have been left to protect themselves and the government has abandoned its responsibility of protecting the citizens.

The president by his lackadaisical attitude to this continuous bloodletting and his inability to curtail these crises all these years has shown us that he does not value the life of Nigerians.

He has simply failed to uphold the Nigerian constitution and his electoral promises.

Nigerians are tired of these empty promises and his inability to tackle Nigeria’s mounting security challenges which was one of the focal points of his campaign that made Nigerians to give him a chance to solve these problems.

One of the reasons Nigerians jettisoned former President Goodluck Jonathan’s government was his inability to tackle these security challenges and we thought president Buhari would do better but what do we have now? Nigerians are now being massacred in their own country even when we have a government that should take decisive action and stop these mindless killings.

Benue state has been a hotbed of hostilities for sometimes now.

The notorious Fulani herdsmen have killed several people in Benue including men of God and shed the blood of innocent Nigerians, yet we have a government that has continuously failed to fulfill its statutory responsibility of protecting the people.

So it is very clear that the security agencies in Nigeria are not really up and doing and are not equal to the task in tackling these security challenges.

The whole security apparatus in Nigeria needs to be overhauled since they cannot tackle Nigeria’s security challenges. 

When you continue to apply a technique that continues to fail you, then you must change that technique or else you will continue to fail.

There must be an urgent change in Nigeria’s security ideas or else these killings can never be tackled.

The sponsors of these dastard killings must be fished out and punished.

The president should personally address Nigerians and publicly condemn these evil acts and come out strongly against these people who want to make Nigeria ungovernable.

These people must not be treated with kit gloves.

They must be identified and brought to book or else we would only be paying lip service to these issues.

The recent Plateau killings as well as the recurring killings in other parts of Nigeria are highly condemnable and the president must urgently rise to the occasion to solve this problem once and for all.

We cannot continue to witness these type of premeditated attacks on our people across Nigeria even when we have a sitting president and the Service Chiefs who seem helpless in tackling the menace. The blood of the innocent people killed in different parts of Nigeria would cry out for justice and until justice is done and the perpetrators fished out and brought to justice, Nigeria may never know peace. 

Since these crises have continued unabated, it is very obvious that the security chiefs are not only incompetent, but they lack the solution to these problems.

It simply shows they don’t know their job and should be immediately disbanded by the president for a new and fresh set of security chiefs with fresh ideas to tackle these mounting security challenges Nigeria is facing at the moment.

The president must listen to the voice of reason and urgently restructure the security architecture in Nigeria and bring in people who are capable of tackling these problems and people who have the solutions to these problems or else these killings might never stop and might even get worse because it is obvious that these killers are hell bent on destabilising Nigeria.

The president has a duty to ensure there is peace in Nigeria because that is why Nigerians gave him the mandate in order to improve the lives of the people.

But if on the other hand the president fails to do this, he should honorably resign and vacate office.

Nigerians will no longer accept lack of performance from the government.

If the president cannot remove these obviously incompetent security chiefs and overhaul the security architecture of Nigeria and replace them with more competent hands, then the president should be ready to tender his resignation letter if these mindless killings of innocent Nigerians continue. 

This anarchy must stop. This conspiracy of silence against Nigeria must stop.  This wickedness must be brought to an end and it can never stop if we don’t take drastic and decisive actions to stem this tide of anarchy and bloodletting.

It is very clear that the security chiefs have run out of ideas on how to tackle these security challenges and therefore they must immediately be sacked by the president and replaced with a new set of security chiefs who can rise to the occasion and solve these perennial security problems that have threatened the existence of Nigeria.

This is the immediate solution to the current quagmire we have found ourselves as a nation.

But if on the other hand the president decides not to sack these security chiefs and these crises continue, he must resign and vacate office for a more competent leader who would be able to solve Nigeria’s challenges.

But if he fails to resign, he must be prepared to be disgraced out of office through the ballot box by the citizens of Nigeria for failing to live up to the people’s expectations and for failing to fulfill his promises to the people.

Nigerians say no to incompetent leaders. Nigeria must work. Nigeria must know peace.

Nigeria must succeed no matter the circumstances and no matter the many obnoxious conspiracies against the corporate existence of Nigeria. 

*Demola, human rights activist, wrote from Lagos.