Pan-Yoruba socio-political organisation, Afenifere, admonished President Muhammadu Buhari on Monday to tackle the lapses in the security architecture of the country like he did in his political party, the All Progressives Congress (APC), last week.
Following recommendations by President Buhari, the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the APC, at its emergency meeting last week, dissolved the party’s National Working Committee (NWC) and replaced it with a caretaker committee headed by Governor Mai Mala Buni of Yobe State.
While lamenting the state of rising insecurity, particularly the killings, escalating cases of kidnapping, banditry and acts of terrorism by Boko Haram insurgents, Afenifere, through its spokesman, Yinka Odumakin, said Nigeria might go under if drastic action was not taken by the president to stem the current tide of criminality.
While lamenting the continued stay of the service chiefs, the group wondered why the president continued to allow them in office even when he had admitted that their performance in the last five years has been less than satisfactory.
“It is clear that we have lost the war against Boko Haram insurgents even though the Federal Government has made so much propaganda about their exploits against Boko Haram. On a daily basis, it is becoming clearer that Boko Haram is on top of us.
“We need to get back to the drawing board, to devise strategies to contain these criminals; otherwise, Nigeria may go under with these insurgents.”
On the reprimand of the service chiefs by the president, Afenifere urged the president to go beyond scolding the security chiefs and relieve them of their duties.
It said if the president believed the best of the service chiefs was not good enough, as he told them, he should sack them immediately instead of leaving them at their posts without any visible results.
“That was a totally unexpected decision. For those who have failed us in the last five years, who are not able to contain insurgency – and the only thing the president could do was to warn them that he was not satisfied with their performance without kicking them out of office, appointing fresh hands, and boosting morale in the armed forces is unacceptable.
“There are young officers who have been demoralised because these service chiefs should have gone long ago and other people would have risen in their place.
“By leaving them when they are not performing, you are killing morale.
“Within your political party, how many months has the crisis taken, yet you dissolved the NWC, put a caretaker committee. Why can’t you rejig the security architecture like that?”
