Insecurity in Nigeria is our collective failure — Maj-Gen Agundu

Major General General Augustine Agundu (Rtd), in this interview with Weekend Trust, lamented the situation in the country and gave suggestions on how it can be tackled.   As a retired General, how did you receive the death of General Rabe? Well, there has been a lot of inference since that very unfortunate situation. But […]

Major General General Augustine Agundu (Rtd), in this interview with Weekend Trust, lamented the situation in the country and gave suggestions on how it can be tackled.

 

As a retired General, how did you receive the death of General Rabe?

Well, there has been a lot of inference since that very unfortunate situation. But as usual, every death is as devastating to us as a nation, as a people, as a family. It is one death too many for us as a nation, and it should not be viewed from the perspective of whether he’s a General or whether it happened to the military.

We have gone through a lot, and it’s our collective failure as a people that we have not been able to place our fingers exactly on how to abate this serious attempt to destabilise the nation through all these issues of banditry and kidnappings and all what not.

Now, we are getting so used to it being part of our lexicon, so that the only debate and the only area of discussion in this country is banditry, kidnappings, and the worst of heinous crimes that humanity has ever seen, and it’s a shame on us all as a people, whether you are a carpenter, a welder, the elite class, or the ordinary person. It’s a big shame, because we have lost our unity totally, and it’s a collective failure. Look at all the successes that the military has recorded in some of these victims that have been released; because we see them on the screen, you will wonder how any person in his right of senses, whether it’s ideological, whether it is criminal intent or whatever, could keep such a person in the jungle, in the midst of nowhere.

Look at this last four or five that the military in Katsina rescued. Look at how they looked. Even those who are in a drought-stricken country, you cannot see any human being like that.

So it means this is a collective failure of every level of leadership. And, in this instance, I’m talking about from the lowest cadre of leadership; from the councilor at the ward level upwards. And, as we have said over and again, security is local. It starts manifesting itself from the local community before it goes into any angle, and all of us as locals, we know exactly those who are the evil ones in our midst.

Let me delve into something that is quite germane; when this administration is talking about local government autonomy, I stand on that very well. Again, when you look at that local government autonomy; what it means is that you must have every instrument of authority to preside over a locality, but what do we have today, all the local government chairmen are not living within their localities.

Tell me one local government chairman that is living with his people. You are elected to be a local government chairman of the local government, but you are living in the city and you are now using your telephone to administer your locality. Can you even talk about having meetings with your councilors? Can you even talk about having a meeting with your local Baales or local chiefs? Also local vigilantes?

Again, that same insecurity that we are talking about, how does it grow? Because the monster that we have now is also the issue of drugs. If these kidnappers are in their right senses, they can’t treat people like that. Look at the successes NDLEA is recording. Look at the amount of drugs. We have all these things on record and everybody will refuse to put their nails at the proper place because everybody is talking about the federal government. Let’s go back to the localities and check where the wrongs are.

As a young officer, I was attending the local government security meeting with all the second class chiefs within my areas of operation. I served in Sokoto State, we were having monthly meetings. As a young officer, I was representing my Battalion in those meetings and the meetings used to be rotational and it used to be within the paradigm of the chiefs and emirs. Things were working; we knew each other.

 

What can be done to check this problem and secure Nigeria?

This is a multi-dimensional question. In the first instance, what we are experiencing now is the infiltration of terrorists from the Sahel and Nigeria is becoming a fertile ground to hide terrorism and their terrorist tendencies because of all that we have, how rich, by vegetation and by climate, we have a very broad landmass that is very rich and inviting for terrorists from other nations.

So, the first thing we need to do, in my own view, is how do we secure our country? The military’s responsibility is to defend the territorial integrity of Nigeria against the terrorists. To defend that territorial integrity, it has to be from outwards inwards.So if we understand that constitutional responsibility, we should be able to prepare the military to defend the country from outwards.

Your territory is defended from outside, inwards. We have many countries around our borders. Of course, we have talked about the long stretch of borders. If we take the western border alone… from Lagos State up to Sokoto State, it is the porosity that is causing the problem. So, securing our country from outside is the primary factor, then we can know how to deal with the security inside.

 

How will General Rabe’s death affect the ongoing fight against insecurity?

Positively, because you can be sure that the military high command; they are blocking all the loopholes. They have upped the game. The point is that once things change, the dance steps also change to make sure that there is no repeat of such. There are a lot of strategies and concepts that are being fine-tuned to make sure that there is no repeat, not only for a General but for the sake of all. We don’t want to lose any more soldiers.

 

In other climes, if someone of that level dies in similar circumstance, what would be the reaction of the government and military?

You see, every country has a way it functions and there are circumstances that surround our own. We are always free to talk about advanced countries and what not, but the ingredients of that advanced country, we are not ready to put it into our own clime.

When you talk about the influence, like the inference you are trying to bring in now, it revolves around maybe the notion of national security and what is the expectation from the government.

Now, government is all of us. You are part of the government as a journalist. You represent a critical layer of government functionaries, you have a role to play. All of us have a role to play.

We must all come together. And now, when we talk about the media, in another sub-paragraph, we can include the members of the civil society as part of it. So, while you, as media, are the conscience of the nation, as you call yourself, for instance, and there are checks and balances of both executive and other arms of government.

When things are going well, you say things are going well. Where it is the other way round, you say it. The point we are having here is that even the terrorists and the kidnappers, they are better organised than us, the elites.

So, we have to be very careful not to paint the picture that the country is on fire. It is common for us to say that Nigeria is a failed state. You paint the picture of the country as a failed state but do you know the ingredients of a failed state? Because the person who is living outside this country will feel that there are no human beings in any space.

When I had some contentions in the field as a commander, I asked some of those politicians, come with me and let us go to the field. Let’s spend one night, just one night. So it is easier for somebody to say what the government is. Who is the government?