Varsity Don Urges FG to Tackle Insecurity
Ibrahim Oyewale in Lokoja
A renowned Professor of Public Administration, Iyokwe Otinche, has raised concerns over the spate of insurgency ravaging the foundation of country.
He urged the federal government to contain it, stressing that that if banditry, terrorism continued unabated they will continue to have serious negative impacts on the national development.
The varsity don made this call while speaking as guest lecturer at the 42nd inaugural lecture of the Federal University, Lokoja yesterday.
In his paper titled, ‘The Looking Glass-Self Perspective of How Never to Build a Nation in the New World Order: Reflections on Nation Building Experiments in Nigeria’, he highlighted some critical issues militating against Nigeria’s national development.
Otinche who reflected on John Pepper Clark’s Poem, noted that ‘The Casualty’ revealed that all Nigerians were made casualties of the Nigerian civil war, observing that all Nigerians are casualties of the armed conflicts, banditry and terrorism ravaging Nigeria.
According to him, “Logically, when issues of national security are discussed, attention is often drawn to war, conflict, militancy, banditry, insurgency, cattle rustling, kidnapping and armed robbery among others.
“But of equal significant impact on national security are ignorance, illiteracy, food crisis and hunger, unemployment, religious and political intolerance and corruption.
“These issues threaten national security, especially in a capitalist state. The high level of insecurity in many parts of the world are reflections of man’s inhumanity to man as theorised by Thomas Hobbes, John Locke and Jean Jacqques Rousseau in their social contract theory.
“This is a reflection of the fact that modern civilisation has failed to bring about world and national peace hence the call for a re-examination of the philosophy of state governance and norms of globalisation.
“In a bid to address these challenges, political leaders have formulated national security policies that are geared towards peace keeping, peace enforcement, peace maintenance, peace building and peace sustenance as global security strategies.
“Based on this vision, the Yar’Adua/Jonathan government used the amnesty programme to assuage the grievances of Niger Delta militants.
“Agenda for national development. The government also introduced the National Counter Terrorism Strategy (NACT and EST) for predictable counter-terrorism and national security management as part of the broad-based governance reforms
“The causes of insecurity plaguing many countries are ideological in nature. Ideology defines class relations and interdependence in the political economy of globalisation. Ideologically, war and conflicts are commodity of trade.
“The actors that produce essential goods and services profits from peace but those that produce arms and ammunition profits from war and conflicts. In order to remain in business, the conflicts entrepreneurs take war or conflict to nations through the back door as militancy, banditry, terrorism and insurgency.
“The benefits of war to these actors are the sale of war machineries, procurement of loans, aids and grants to finance the war, post-war reconstruction and the signing of defense pacts to foster military globalisation.
“This thesis partly explains the origin of insecurity in Nigeria. Based on this premise described the Boko Haram sect as a mirage that has multifaceted identities. Argued that the optimists viewed it diagonally and call it a religious sect.
“The pessimist viewed it vertically and called it a government. It is either the government in power or the disgruntled elements opposed to the current rationalisation of power. The realist viewed it horizontally and called it the forces of globalisation.
“The masks on the faces of its members becloud their conscience hence no audience, no dialogue and no consensus when the interest they pursue is achieved, they change their identity and redefine their interest to suit the new identity hence the nominal transition from Boko Haram to bandits, herdsmen militia and Lakurawa among others.
In his further analysis, he noted that even the identity of the sponsors of the sect, the process of membership recruitment and training, sources of funds and weapon supply remain a mirage. These dialectics partly shapes the political economy of insecurity in Nigeria and the ambivalence in its resolutions.
“The resultant displacement of victims has high humanitarian consequences on many Nigerians. The drive for the expansion of neo colonial empire and the capture of national resources guided by capitalist vision attract me to remarked metaphorically that ‘he who says capitalism says warfare and he who says socialism says welfare,” he stated
He therefore concluded in generic terms the utilitarian benefits of terrorism, banditry, war or conflicts to Nigerians is negative.
“My fear is that if the banditry and terrorism, particularly in northern Nigeria last longer than necessary, it will impact negatively on regional development and the North-South divide. The security situation in Nigeria can be described in W. B. Yeats words thus: “Turning and turning in the widening gyre, the falcon cannot hear the falconer, things fall apart, the centre cannot hold. Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,” Otinche posited.