By Erasmus Ikhide
PRESIDENT Bola Ahmed Tinubu and the make-believe Nigerian military absolutism have had their scaffolding foundation jolted out of pre-eminence with the renewed reign of terror and terrorism sweeping across the swaths of the country where ten of thousands are slaughtered by the day.
The Service Chiefs amongst whom are General Christopher Gwabin Musa, the Chief of Defence Staff and General Olufemi Oluyede, the Chief of Army Staff, Emmanuel Ogalla, Chief of Naval Staff, Air Marshal Hassan Bala Abubakar, Chief of Air Staff, IGP Kayode Egbetokun and Adeola Oluwatosin Ajayi, the current Director-General of the State Security Service (SSS) have been groping in the dark — while presiding over paralyzed and archaic security architecture — as terrorists seized the nation by the scuff of the neck in bloodbath.
In his quiet, abdicating recesses, President Tinubu must have been enamored, wondering deeply how untrained and unwashed terrorists could audaciously rout the military and turned the country into a nation of perpetual mourners. Could it be that the military has receded into a state of antiquity or is it that its leadership has become remorselessly shameless to the point that the unrelenting graft, tactically has been crafted in a bid to cow the President into submission. What does President Tinubu and the Service Chiefs know about the infinite terrorism that the rest of us don’t know?
The other day, Zamfara State Governor, Mr. Dauda Lawal claimed that he knows the whereabouts of bandits in his state but security agents won’t act without permission from Abuja. Governor Lawal asserts that he can identify the exact locations of bandit leaders but he is powerless to act because heads of security agencies take orders from Abuja — thus paying lip service to the provisions of the 1999 Constitution as ammended— that Governors are the Chief Security Officers of their respective States. He believes that with direct control over the respective security agencies, he could wipe out banditry in Zamfara within two months.
Like many states across the country, Zamfara has faced severe crises of banditry, including kidnappings, killings, and mass displacement of villagers. Recently, over a thousand citizens have been killed while more than 50 people have been abducted in separate attacks across Zamfara State. In the same state, bandits overran a military base in Zamfara, killing 12 officers and carting away weapons. In the same attack, nine villagers were shot dead and over 100 women and children kidnapped during a brutal raid by armed bandits.
Outside Zamfara, the security situation in Katsina State and other parts of northern Nigeria has been dire, with bandits and terrorists wreaking havoc on communities. Bandits have launched coordinated attacks on villages, killing and abducting residents. For instance, in Malumfashi Local Government Area, bandits invaded villages, abducting and killing people at will and in their thousands unreported.
While the Service Chiefs, DG of SSS and IGP have been chasing citizens critiquing Tinubu’s insensitive and dehumanizing policies that has pauperized Nigerians, Katsina State government has been engaged in peace negotiations with bandit leaders, — including Isiya Kwashen Garwa — who facilitated the release of 70 kidnap victims in Faskari Local Government Area. On the surface, the peace deal is enticing, but in the long run, these negotiations can’t bring lasting peace because the bandits are fragmented and driven by profit motives!
Tragically and unknown to the Katsina State Government involved in the kinetic deal that the talks will undoubtedly inflate their profits instead of addressing the root causes of the violence, because the negotiations are less about choice than survival, given the state’s limited capacity to protect its citizens. These peace deals, rather than bring relief, will further incite vicious attacks and more sanguinary bloodbath that will not spare children, women, and the elderly alike.
The security situation is further complicated by the porous border between Nigeria and neighboring countries, which allows bandits to easily move in and out of the country. There are concerns about the opaque nature of accountability and transparency in the disbursement of funds budgetted towards government’s efforts at tackling the challenge of insecurity, with allegations of corruption and complicity in the defence sector.
The humanitarian toll of the crisis is significant, with thousands of lives lost, millions displaced, and education disrupted by mass abductions. One would have thought that General Christopher Musa — having remotely detected that those killing Nigerian citizens are foreigners from neighbouring countries — his military training in collaboration with the other Service Chiefs would have helped him to stop the scourge and crush the ragtag terrorist insurrection.
The question wafting in the air, has been, could the claim of the Canadian High Court be correct that APC/PDP are Terrorist Organisations? The latter assertion of the Zamfara State Governor that Abuja is hindering the fight against bandits becomes instructive in this regard. Can the above assertions be the reasons the nation’s security architecture has been unable to dismantle the command structure of the terrorist groups, notorious for audacious kidnappings, attacks, and terror campaigns across Nigeria?
How well-intentioned is the governments’ resolve to crack the wall of impunity that these blood-sucking monsters of depravity had built for themselves for nearly two decades? Can it also be true that the bloodthirsty unwashed dogs and homicidal beasts who are still collecting taxes from the locales remit some percentages to military men in the battlefield since allowances from the military headquarters are too meagre to keep them going.
In every household in Nigeria today, including the toiling masses in all agriculture embraced communities from Yobe to Enugu to Benue to Zamfara to Edo to Oyo States and the rest are being slaughtered in organized massacre across the country, rendering the pristine nature of humanity irreversible in its irredeemable savagery. This is not to dispute the unwavering heroism and selfless sacrifices of the middle class security personnel and those at the lowest rung of the ladder at the behest of Nigerian citizens.
For the record, the Nigerian National Defence budget for 2024 is substantial, with the Ministry of Defence receiving the highest allocation. The Ministry of Defence allocation was N1.3 trillion, Nigerian Army budget was N789.2 billion, including personnel emolument put at N789.2 billion, overhead budget N45.270 billion, capital budget N138.749 billion. Other security agencies like the Ministry of Police Affairs got N869.121 billion, the office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) got N199.763 billion. These allocations are part of the larger 2024 Appropriation Bill, which totals N27.5 trillion, with a projected deficit of N9.18 trillion. The budget prioritizes national defence, internal security, human capital development, local job creation, and social security.
Meanwhile, the Nigerian National Defence budget for 2025 is approximately N4.91 trillion, which translates to around $3.16 billion. This allocation is aimed at strengthening the operational capacity of Nigeria’s security agencies, including the Armed Forces, the Nigerian Police Force, and paramilitary organizations. Here’s a breakdown of how the Defence budget fits into the larger 2025 budget: Defence and Security got N4.91 trillion, infrastructure received N4.06 trillion, education consumed N3.52 trillion, while health got N2.48 trillion. The total budget for 2025 is N47.9 trillion, with a projected deficit of N13.08 trillion and revenue target of N34.82 trillion. The budget prioritizes security, infrastructure, education, and healthcare, reflecting the government’s commitment to addressing pressing challenges and promoting economic growth.
It’s rather mind-numbing and literally evicerating to hear that all Nigerian military and ancillary security agencies gave the citizens from the N77.4 trillion in the last two years was tears, sorrow and deaths. How would such a humongous amount be released to solve security challenges while less than one twelfth of the same amount could fix the problem of 20 million out of school children in the north that has become breading grounds for terrorism, fix healthcare services, job creation, create youth empowerment initiatives and resolve women’s welfare issues and stand up to the disastrous multidimensional poverty?
I know of more than ten top officers in the hierarchy of the military, who in and out of service have allegedly used the proceeds from the transactional warfare in the north to build five-star hotels in and out of the country — living large without consequences — even after my reports. The question has been, is there any further need to keep unpatriotic, transactional, unregenerated, archaic and corrupt military leadership in offibce when Netherlands had to close down 31 prisons across the country due to a lack of inmates. In 2009, the Dutch justice ministry announced the closure of 8 prisons, resulting in 1,200 job losses.
Netherlands made the decision when crime rates started declining and it led to a decrease in prison populations. In 2014 and beyond, the Netherlands continued to close prisons, with reports indicating that around 19 prisons were shut down due to low inmate numbers. This move was expected to result in approximately 1,900 prison workers losing their jobs. Since 2004, it is on record that the Netherlands has closed over 23 prisons due to decreasing crime rates and prison populations. It doesn’t need retelling that state failure gave birth to terrorism which papering the wall of military paralysis can’t ever solved!
Now this: should President Tinubu consider replacing the Service Chiefs with another set of well grounded Service Chiefs who are not in short supply within the military conclave or simply embrace the extreme option of engaging the terrorists to supplant the Service Chiefs now that the country is trembling beneath the weight of terror and grief.
Either of the two options are left for the Preesident to consider, having been an authoritarian and a perfect embodiment of the contradictions and ambiguities of our democracy. Tinubu has an urgent choice to make: allow the mass massacre of precious lives and widespread dead to feste — arising from untamed and pampered terrorists — or a combination of creeping ascendancy to democratic despotism will more quickly set the nation aflame faster than insecurity that is threatening to reduce the nation to ashes.
Erasmus Ikhide contributed this piece via: ikhideluckyerasmus@gmail.com.
