The federal government of Nigeria has certified Nigeria a safe country, assuring that terrorists, bandits and their cohorts would never hold citizens of the country to ransom again.
Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, gave the country’s security a clean bill of health at a joint press briefing in Abuja with three of his counterparts: the ministers of Defence, Bashir Salihi Magashi; Police Affairs, Mohammed Maigari Dingyadi; Interior, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola.
With them at the briefing was the Chief of Defence Staff Lucky Irabor.
Speaking on the security situation in the country, Mohammed said as far as the ‘daunting security challenges’ are concerned, ‘the worst is over.’
He noted that the issue of security had dominated national discourse in recent times against the background of terrorism, banditry, and kidnapping in the North-East, North-West and North Central; separatist violence and crude oil theft in the South-East and South-South as well as cultism, armed robbery, and sundry crimes in the South-West.
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The minister however said, ‘While we may not be there yet, our military and other security agencies have succeeded – and are succeeding – in substantially restoring security across the nation.’
Explaining why the war against terror has lingered, he noted that whereas in conventional warfare, the parties can declare a truce or cessation of hostilities, upon reaching an agreement, it is not the same as the kind of unconventional warfare that Nigeria’s military had been fighting in recent years.
‘We are therefore not saying the battle is over. No. What we are saying is that our military and other security agents have been able to contain the daunting security challenges we face, and that the worst is indeed over. We have now put the terrorists, bandits and their ilk on the run and we will not relent until they have been crushed,’ he stated.
Mohammed acknowledged that the security challenges faced by the current Administration – from terrorism to banditry to kidnapping to separatist violence to crude oil theft to armed robbery and sundry crimes – had been daunting.
According to him, the situation isundoubtedly the greatest challenge to the peace and security of Nigeria since the civil war from 1967 to 1970.
He continued: “It is the kind of challenge that would have overwhelmed many nations. But thanks to the purposeful leadership of President Muhammadu Buhari, we can say, I want to repeat, that the worst is over and peace and security are gradually returning to the land.
“Please don’t misunderstand or misrepresent this assertion. We may still witness isolated cases of security challenges here and there, but it will not be on the scale that we have witnessed in the past.”
On his part, the minister of Defence, Major General Magashi, said the Nigerian military is currently conducting several operations all over the country as well as Peace Support Operations in some countries, the recent being the Republic of Guinea Bissau.
He said this must not, however, be misconstrued to mean that there are crises all over the country.
Magashi said the contemporary threat to environment is such that a single terrorist or band of terrorists, even though completely isolated in remote rural places, can conduct a terrorist campaign.
He said terrorism by itself has far less value than the publicity that it generates, adding that it is on this basis that the briefing covers ongoing military efforts across the six geo-political zones of the country as well as Nigeria’s participation in Peace Support Operation in Republic of Guinea Bissau.
