President Muhammadu Buhari on Thursday told the nation’s security chiefs in no uncertain terms that he was unhappy with them for failing in their duties to halt the the spike in insecurity across the country.
At a meeting with heads of intelligence and security chiefs in the country at the Aso Rock Villa, the President warned them that excuses would no longer be tolerated.
Giving an insight into what transpired at the the closed-door parley, National Security Adviser (NSA), Maj. Gen. Babagana Mungonu (rted), told journalists that the President also ordered him to meet with all northern western governors and that of Niger State, to synergise on solutions.
According to Monguno: “Today’s meeting basically focused on recent developments. Mr. President has expressed great concern over the declining security situation in the country.
“He is extremely unhappy about what is happening and he feels that, even though the security agencies are doing their best, their best is not good enough for him and wants and immediate reversal of the current trend and immediate reversal of our misfortunes in all their dimensions.
The President warned the security agencies to take into consideration the wider implication of the worsening security situation and declared that “he is not going to accept any further escalation of the security situation”, especially as “no one (security chief) was forced on him, he selected everyone individually based on what he feels their records had revealed” and must live up to the expectations and not disappoint Nigerians.
Buhari further charged them to tackle the issues of proliferation of drugs, small arms and light weapons, as the go hand in hand with the major issues of banditry and terrorism in the country.
Monguno further revealed that “in my own brief, I dwelt on that issue and I raised concern that whatever we intend to achieve, we will not be able to get to the promised land unless we wrestle this issue of unrestrained acquisition of unregistered SIM cards.
“Mr. President has directed that I, as the National Security Adviser, should link up with the honourable minister of Communications and Digital Economy, to workout a blueprint to ensure the end of the irresponsible use of any SIM card.”
While the NSA said he would be holding a meeting with Governor of the Northwest zone and Niger States in Abuja, he lamented the lack of synergy within the security sector.
“This has to be addressed. We must have a central platform to coordinate all the efforts, all operations and security. In the final analysis, Mr. President has said thay everyone is doing his best but his best is not good enough, that should send a signal to all of us.”
The NSA admitted that “we have to go back to the drawing board, nothing is ever too late. It’s regrettable that lives have been lost, a lot of chaos has arisen, but that doesn’t mean we ditch all our efforts.
“We are going to go back and that is why I emphasized on collective efforts; the convergence of all our efforts so that we can streamline and develop more meaningful strategies, but definitely there will be a change.”
He pointed out though, that the issue of sacking or retaining any security chief remains the prerogative of the President and he would not delve into that.
