Time to deregulate policing, liberalize guns to responsible citizens, private security agencies ~ by Chukwuemeka Onyesoh
Time to deregulate policing to the zones and liberalize guns to responsible citizens and private security agencies – 81st birthday message of Prince Chukwuemeka Onyesoh
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Abstract: Nigeria is undergoing a very grave existential threat dominated by terrorism and governance abnegation.
To secure the lives and property of Nigerian citizens, it is time to de-regulate the Nigerian over-centralized policing to, at least the zones under Zonal Police Command (not to be commanded from the centre under the Nigerian Police) and liberalize the right to own automatic weapons to responsible private citizens and Security Agencies.
If the governments of the federation accept Chapter II, Section 14(2)(b) of the Constitution which clearly states that ”the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government,” in the face of present security failure even in the Federal Capital Territory of Abuja, any Political Party, President, Governor or Parliamentarian (federal or state) who opposes the deregulation of policing and the Nigerian citizens’ right to be armed to defend themselves under the present absolute failure of the exclusive federal security architecture, should be publicly identified and proclaimed as part and parcel of present terrorism against the Nigerian people and therefore a terrorist(s) in government!
Presentation
The present security situation in Nigeria is sordid and therefore worse than ever before:
1. Life in Nigeria is worse than “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short” (Hobbes). We are indeed back to the 7th century AD (early Medieval Age) when non-state actors freely raided communities, killed or kidnapped for enslavement as many as they cared, all in the name of converting them by force to the invaders’ religious belief (Arabian Nights). In this 21st Century world, the Nigerian governments’ reactions to gruesome massacres, rapes and kidnap of citizens by terrorists, end with mere condemnations of the atrocities; and prayers that the Almighty God would expose the criminals and put a stop to the butcheries, as if there is no government spending the people’s money on securing their lives and property.
2. Nigeria is aping the USA presidential model which is a world-wide failure in human development, except perhaps, in USA only; as against parliamentary democracy which dominates high human development, world-wide.
Yet after the recent Uvalde, Texas massacre of 19 students and 2 teachers and 17 people injured, United States President and legislators, in accord with their overt acceptance of governance as a social contract between the government and the governed who had surrendered various personal rights in place of State-provided security of life and property and welfare, rose up in arms to regulate overtly liberal gun laws which only limit gun ownership to age between 18 and 21 years.
3. Contrary to the best interest and safety of Nigerians, the Federal Government of Nigeria appeared to have chosen to enhance the Nigeria environment for terrorists and indeed appear to collaborate with and condone terrorists, as Nigeria got more insecure, starting from 2015 when by the 2015 Global Terrorist Index (GTI) based on 2014 figures, it achieved the status of the 3rd most terrorised country in the world with annual increasing casualties of deaths due to terrorism. The suspected condonation/encouragement of terrorism by the Federal Government of Nigeria is evidenced by very many questionable policy implementations executed by the same government since 2016, namely (a) Failure since 2018 to renew firearms licences to private citizen as per the Inspector General’s Press Release Nationwide of 26th February, 2018 deceptively titled “Inspector General of Police Orders the Commencement of Mopping up, Seizure and Recovery from Wrong Hands; Prohibited and Other Illegal Firearms and Ammunition, Weapons and Devices Locally Fabricated or Modified that Can Cause Death etc.;”
(b) Deliberate failure to effectively police northern borders from which militants from the Sahel region pour into Nigeria unrestricted;
(c) The visa-on-arrival policy implemented from January 2020, to promote trade with other Africans but ostensively and deviously intended to enable Fulani militants from all over Africa pour into Nigeria even during Covid-19 lock down. This is as Nigeria remained world capital of poverty and increasingly more unstable and terrorised, and deaths due to terrorism increased from 1,532 in 2017 to 2,040 in 2018 and as terrorist attacks increased by 49% between 2020 and 2021, largely due to increased attacks by Cattle Fulani herdsmen Islamic militants which overtook Boko Haram nation-wide in number of attacks/killings;
(d) Ceding forests all over Nigeria to heavily armed Fulani militants to camp undisturbed, from which they terrorise Nigerians, with no known efforts to flush them out;
(e) Allowing militants easy access to deadly highly sophisticated weapons including bombs with which they easily attack even military installations;
(f) Condoning terrorist attacks by doing nothing to stop them and/or even assisting the terrorists covertly;
(g) As publicly admitted by current National Security Adviser, corruptly diverting funds (billions of US Dollars) meant for acquiring modern security equipment to meet up the challenges of militant terrorism and leaving the agencies less equipped than the terrorists;
(h) Apart from using the security services to condone the herders’ acts of terrorism, also trying through Ruga, Grazing Routes, Cattle Colonies, Water Resources and other obnoxious policies, to forcefully re-settle violent Fulani pastoralists throughout the country, thus deliberately worsening the security situation;
(i) and very many others.
4. Added to other bloody incidents including the killing of Reverend Fathers and priests in Benue, Plateau and Southern Kaduna, three recent horrible terror attacks/killings expose the dangerous direction these Islamic terrorists are headed to:
(i). Desecration of Christianity by serial kidnap and/or killing of Roman Catholic Reverend Fathers in various parts of Nigeria particularly in the Middle Belt by Islamic terrorists.
(ii). Humiliation of Christianity by the kidnap on Sunday, 29th May 2022 of Methodist Church Prelate, His Eminence Samuel Uche along with another Bishop of Methodist Church and the Prelate’s chaplain on Enugu-Port Harcourt Expressway in Umunnochi Local Government Area of Abia State by Fulani herdsmen militants and their release after the victims paid N100Million ransom to the militants the next day.
(iii). The St. Francis Catholic Church, Owo, Ondo State massacre of over 50 Christians and wounding of several, during a High Mass on Pentecost/Whitsunday Sunday, 5th June 2022 in commemoration of the descent of the Holy Spirit on the Apostles and other disciples following the Crucifixion, Resurrection, and Ascension of Jesus Christ, is the ultimate desecration of Christianity by the Nigerian government condoned Islamic Jihadist terrorists.
5. The Owo attack is the semi-final phase of Jihadist Islamisation of Nigeria conceived a long time ago and formally declared by late Sir Ahmadu Bello, Premier of the Northern Region, in his undisguised Jihad proclamation published by the extinct Lagos newspaper, “The Parrot” of Oct.12, 1960 – “. . .We must use the minorities in the North as willing tools, and the South as conquered territories and never allow them to have control of their future.”
6. Under General Olusegun Obasanjo as military Head of State, his deputy, Gen. Shehu Musa Yardua planted the “explosive Sharia” in the 1979 Constitution. Typically Sharia controversies explode terrorism in any country that adopts it with its implied feudalism which enables the rulers to exploit the poor masses. Sharia is installed in the very foundations of the 1999 Constitution which is a mere extension of the 1979, despite the deception in its Section 10.
From 2015 to 2022, the six most terrorized countries of the world, namely Afghanistan, Iraq, Nigeria, Somalia, Burkina Faso and Syria, are under Sharia, wholly or partly. The instability in Nigeria is deeply rooted in Sharia. The killing/burning of the corpse of Deborah Yakubu by fellow students in Sokoto (May 2022) is an extension of a trend of Moslem killings with no prosecution dating from the Jos riots of 1945, Kano riots of 1953, Gideon Akaluka 1995 lone killing in Kano; Christiana Oluwatoyin Oluwasesin killing and burning of her corpse in Gombe, 2007, and the outrageous strangling of 74-year old Mrs Bridget Agbahime in Kano, 2016 among several others. Killing without consequence is license to kill any time with a view to restoring living in the 21st century to the times before the Holy Prophet died in 632 AD.
7. The Gen. Ibrahim Babangida – sponsored Abuja 1989 Islam-in-Africa Conference ‘secret resolutions’ revealed the set objectives of the Conference on Nigeria – “To show the whole world that Nigeria is truly an Islamic nation . . . to support the establishment and application of Shari’a . . . To eradicate, in all forms and ramifications, all non-Muslim religions in member nations . . . To ensure the declaration of Nigeria (the 24th African and 46th world member of the OIC) a Federal Islamic Sultanate . . .” To deliver these bizarre resolutions is the excruciating labour pains Nigeria has been struggling with since 29th May 2015.
8. As far back as August 2001, the present Head of State of Nigeria had openly advocated for full Sharia Code all over Nigeria in his declaration:
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“I will continue to show openly and inside me the total commitment to the Sharia movement that is sweeping all over Nigeria. . . God willing, we will not stop the agitation for the total implementation of the Sharia in the country . . . “ – AFP
General Muhammadu Buhari therefore has pursued his goal of the total Sharianisation of Nigeria as elected President of Nigeria in subtle and mainly not so subtle ways. He never hid his intensions, even though they violate the Constitution of Nigeria and other Laws of Nigeria. There must be a day of reckoning. The Buhari promoters/financiers of 2015 must be held to account for leading Nigeria into this suicide with both eyes open.
9. Throughout the ages, the implementation of Sharia all over the world has largely succeeded, not by proselyting, but by violence. Nigeria cannot be an exception. Violence yields instability which promotes poverty and other negatives in human development and therefore more instability – a vicious cycle. It gets worse, as the nation’s security agencies are deliberately compromised, Sharianised and left confused, if not comatose.
10. The Owo massacre is the recent semi climax. The siege by Islamic terrorists of Abuja is yet another. Many more are bound to come in various directions in the country; and as is traditional, has no end, unless meaningfully resisted. Otherwise, unchallenged, the destination is the Sultanate of Nigeria.
11. Against the above background, and in view of the sordid and deteriorating insecurity all over Nigeria, agitation for the States and the National Assembly to urgently pass resolutions, amending the Nigerian Constitution where necessary, for:
i. Establishment of independent Zonal Police by groups of States in every zone. State Police, is unaffordable by over 32 states of the Federation which owe years of enormous sums of salaries and pensions. State Police is subject to more abuse, the same way Aso Rock has abused the Federal Security agencies since 1999. Imagine what the intemperate power-that-be in Lagos, Kaduna, Kano, Ebonyi or Rivers to name but a few, would do to their opponents with a State Police, exclusively controlled by them, if one exists?. Giving more funds to present security agencies is merely enriching the heads of the units. Remember the recent NSA disclosures on the missing Billions of US Dollars allocated for security equipment – no cash; no stock and no order in process.
ii. Liberalizing of ownership of automatic weapons to responsible citizens and private security agencies.
12. It becomes imperative that Nigeria must now amend the Constitution and put the control of policing on the Concurrent and Residual Lists in order to decentralise the maintenance of law and order and enable the sub-national units – the zones, states, local governments and communities, where affordable – to play their roles in law enforcement, central security administration having woefully failed Nigeria. To secure over 200 million people spread over 923,768 square kilometres requires levels of policing. I insist Nigeria starts with zonal Police only. We can gradually graduate into State, local government and communities as our leaders perfect the discipline required in owning police formation.
Nigeria has been overtaken by fundamentalist terrorists and it is uncommon to ever be able to entirely rid the country of them. Thus, as the country grows more unstable, it would continue to sink deeper into more extreme poverty; thus generating more insecurity through increased criminality. Nigeria will therefore be safer with well-armed deregulated policing, along with the arming of private security agencies and responsible citizens. All Presidential candidates in the 2023 elections must subscribe to this undertaking.
President Buhari must be reminded that it is only an un-fatherly father that with-holds guns to his children and merely watches as they are being butchered by invaders, consumed only by the fear of losing control over the children. As the father of the nation, he must let go the exclusive official control of guns to save his children. Like Emperor Nero, history will not forgive him if he fails to do so.
On the South-East sit-at-home
Independent People of Biafra (IPOB) by its activities needs to go back to the drawing board to fully understand the concept of the right to self-determination and how to achieve it peacefully. Actualising the right is a political process which includes canvassing for the right, getting the people, on whose behalf it is agitating, pass the relevant resolutions for plebiscite, canvassing for the relevant “YES” vote of approval for independence, getting the relevant majority vote and subsequent procedures in the National Assembly. In a situation like Nigeria in which there is no provision for secession in the Constitution, in pacifist agitation, it requires collaborative efforts with regional and central governments. Abuse or disrespect of any, is counter-productive. IPOB must therefore stop abusing anybody in Nigeria and unnecessarily flexing of muscles it doesn’t officially have. It is not a government; nor is it elected. It is a voluntary organisation executing an important assignment on behalf of an oppressed and endangered people; and must do so as per established standards and world best practice (Read my 2017 book, “TO THE RESCUE –The right to Self Determination – the Pathway to a Federation of Peoples with no Shared Values).
Using any form of force on the people you are supposed to liberate like, locking them up in their homes for one or two days weekly, is a form of genocide and terrorism. It violates the concept of pacifism. If force is used to compel them to support agitation, will they also be forced to vote in the plebiscite? Force used today can kill the votes required tomorrow, as the people begin to see IPOB in a light not different from that of oppressive Abuja.
Besides, and very importantly, total destruction of the economy of the South East is what Abuja has been furiously working on since the end of the war in 1970; but they have not attempted anything half as drastic as the present sit-at-home.
Mahatma Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, the founder of sit-at-home as pacifist means of agitating for the independence of India, never employed sit-at-home for his personal freedom. Nelson Mandela was in prison for 27 years but never used it to free himself. Neither did Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Junior of US.
Leading liberation struggle for one’s people is a volunteer effort for which such leaders invariably are willing to lay down their lives. That is why such liberators, dead or alive, are forever loved and adored. Punishing one’s people by denying most their daily bread, cannot be demonstration of love.
I am therefore pleading with Mazi Nnamdi Kanu to demonstrate love, not hatred, to the Igbo nation by calling off all forms of sit-at-home. It impoverishes and diminishes the very people he claims to love, and creates more instability in the region. Abuja is celebrating IPOB doing their dirty job in the region. The Judge trying the case, rightly does not give a damn as to whether you lock up the Igbo nation for one year! She is required, by world best practice, to ignore such as antics.
And finally, IPOB is required by accepted protocol to extend full courtesies to anyone in Aso Rock as Head of State, if not for any other reason, his signature is imperative for any change in the present structure of Nigeria. Over-riding his veto might be impossible. Besides, routine protocol requires that citizens should be civil to their Head of State. In Igbo protocol a presenter is required to cover his face whilst addressing the Eze (king) on an issue the king might not like. It is not in Igbo tradition to abuse our kings of the old before Nigeria invaded Igbo culture.
Civility must also be extended to the leaders of all Nigeria ethnic nationalities. Today, most who did not in 1966-70 understand the game playing out, are now wiser. Most are in as much shoes, or worse, as the Igbo nation.
I like what 83-years old Prof. Stephen Adebanji Akintoye, the President of the Ilana Omo Oodua is doing for the self-determination of the Yoruba nation and how he goes about it. It is a model for agitation for the right to self-determination. A pacifist agitator for such right needs to be well-informed. Read more.
Chukwuemeka I. Onyesoh,
(Author, Writer and Rights Advocate)
Okpala Eze & Oba na Nri, Enugu
