Security Leadership Failure in Nigeria: An Impetus for Self-Defence

By Ogiri John Ogiri

So far, facts of recent security infractions in some rural areas in Nigeria have invalidated the government-sponsored lie from Abuja that Nigerians are very secure in their various communities. Painful testimonies from many rural farmers and students in some selected states in the North, West, East and South have so far revealed that the government has deliberately failed in protecting the people for whom government was, in the first place, established. Things have now degenerated so badly that citizens have now taken to self-defence as a last security resort. 

Only recently, we witnessed the launch of various regional security networks in the North, South, West and now in the East of our country. We can choose to either accept or reject the obvious reality that the launch of these security networks have vindicated those who have always held that this government has failed in the area of security. At least, we can now see clearly.

As long as we continue to pamper killers in the guise of unsolicited amnesty, punish hardworking military personnel who only genuinely ask for better equipment for their colleagues: as long as we continue to shield uniformed saboteurs , who work against the effort of our altruistic military operatives by divulging top secret intelligence information to those against whom we fight, as long as we continue to see, as intolerable enemies, those who genuinely speak against deliberate inactions of the government of the day in critical areas of security, economy and justice, as long as we continue to jail concerned protesting citizens against unpopular policy choices of the government: as long as the government continues to make a spider web out of our security operatives- building them with much power to hold the weak, sometimes, unarmed peaceful protesters and brutally crush them while mobilizing them with much weaker military paraphernalia that demoralize and make them shiver before the strong, cases of various security breaches may continue to linger. This being the case, self-defence becomes a motivated necessity.

©Ogiri John Ogiri.