• Thursday, March 28, 2024
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BusinessDay

Insecurity: Yakasai, Ibrahim back Ooni, seek community leaders’ action against insurgents

insecurity in nigeria
As Nigerians continue to express their concerns over the current precarious security situation in the country, eminent Nigerians have called on community leaders to strengthen community-based actions against insecurity.

 

Elder Statesman, Tanko Yakasai, and the executive director of Civil Society and Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC), Auwal Ibrahim, speaking separately to BusinessDay in Abuja on Friday, called on community leaders to mobilise their communities against insurrections in their domain.
They also seek actions that will encourage communities to expose suspected criminals in their domain, which in their thoughts will encourage quick response by security agencies to the issues of insecurity.
Yakassai, while reacting to the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi’s Thursday meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa, linked the current rise in Boko Haram’s activities to the absence of such action by the community leaders.
“When these criminals know that the people are against them, it will be difficult for their activities to have strong foothold wherever they are operating from,” he said.
Yakassai, who dismissed the idea that Nigeria may be heading for war, said the country would not go to war on the account of “a few miscreants”.
He also backed President Buhari’s directives that Fulani should remain and carry out their legitimate businesses in any parts of Nigeria of their choice, describing calls by the Northern elders for the Fulani to return to the north as “reckless and insensitive”.
The Ooni had while speaking with State House correspondents after his meeting with Buhari on Thursday expressed fears that the northern elders’ call “may lead to war in the country”.
CISLAC director Ibrahim, who also backed the Ooni’s visit on behalf of the South West traditional rulers towards improving security situation in the country, said, “If other traditional leaders had expressed similar concerns in Zamfara, the situation would not have deteriorated to the level it is now.”
Ibrahim said every concerned royal father who has not soiled his hands must do what the Ooni has done.
“It is a common knowledge that some traditional rulers were fingered in the security crises in their domain and that it why it was difficult for the security agencies to tackle the issue,” he said.
The Ooni of Ife had warned politicians in the country not to encourage anarchy by blowing issues out of proportion.
Thursday’s visit by the Ooni to Buhari came on the heels of a quit notice by the Northern Elders Forum to herders to leave the southern part of the country and return home.
President Buhari had on Wednesday asked the herders to disregard the notice and stay put in any part of the country they chose to live.
“I came to speak on behalf of other traditional rulers. The issue at hand in the south west is real. The issue of insecurity, we that live in the remote and rural areas of the south western part of the country, most of the bushes are occupied by strange people and we decided to work with the government to fish them out,” Ooni had said on Thursday.
“Everybody is beating the drums of war, we don’t want war…we want something better for our youths. We should better use them for something good other than shouting war and anarchy. We don’t want that. We told the President that and he is on the same page with us,” he said.
“Politicians should be careful not to blow things out of proportion. We should make sure things are right and the President has given good directives to security chiefs including the IG to visit all traditional institutions in the south west,” he added.
Oba Ogunlusi II pointed out that everything must be done to put all security agencies to good use as well as work with the locals to separate the bad eggs.
“We shouldn’t keep over-hyping war and we still want to keep the peace in the south west. We don’t want anarchy. What is important is for the youths not to take laws into their hands, killing and causing violence. The drums of war are resonating loud and we are very worried. We need more federal apparatus to defend ourselves. Reinforcement from federal government. We understand more than anybody. We don’t want war and we want to work with government to bring peace. We are not saying all Fulanis are bad, it’s about the bad guys working under the name of Fulanis,” he said.
He said President Buhari assured him that he would say his own side of the story on the issue of Ruga because it was being taken out of context.