Following the recent brutal armed robbery incident in Offa, Kwara State, the Senate passed a resolution calling on the Federal Government to establish a Nigerian Army Forward Operating Base in Offa to cover the Kwara South Senatorial District due to recurring armed robbery cases in that area.
According to reports, about 30 armed robbers equipped with AK47 rifles and explosives, raided six banks in Offa leaving over 30 Nigerians dead including nine policemen, and making away with millions of naira in a two-hour operation in which they operated unchallenged.
How could the robbers have been challenged when their first port of call on entering into Offa was to viciously invade the Divisional Police Station in the town, shooting with reckless abandon and leaving nine policemen dead and the policemen who survived fled for their dear lives.
The undistinguished senators who only recently held a security summit to examine solutions to the increasing spate of insecurity across Nigeria believe the presence of the Nigerian Army in the Kwara South Senatorial District would serve as a deterrent to recurring armed robbery cases in that area.
The lawmakers are worried that if armed robbery attacks in the Kwara South Senatorial district are not stopped, financial institutions in that area may decide to close shop and that this may cripple commercial activities in Offa town and surrounding environs with devastating consequences.
However, in passing the resolution calling for the establishment of a military base in Kwara South Senatorial district, the senators conveniently forgot to mention that the Nigerian Army is currently deployed in internal security operations in 34 out of the 36 states of the federation.
The presence of the army in all but two states on active internal security duties does not seem to be having the desired result as on a daily basis we are regaled with news across Nigeria associated with sorrow, tears and blood, to borrow words from the late Afrobeat king, Fela.
From confronting the Boko Haram insurgency in the North-East, to tackling the menace of cattle rustling in the North-West, to its involvement in clashes between herdsmen and farmers in the North-Central, and then engaging with Niger Delta militants and flag-waving pro-Biafran agitators in the East, the Nigerian Army is fully occupied.
When you add the numerous joint patrol teams that the Nigerian Army is part of across Nigeria that are tackling armed robbery and kidnapping, sabotage of public assets and even their involvement in motor traffic duties like in the Apapa area of Lagos State, you suddenly realise that something is massively wrong.
Unlike our senators, what hits you right in the face is how an institution that was established primarily to protect and defend the territorial integrity of Nigeria and engage with the external attackers of Nigeria has now mainly become an institution engaged in maintaining Nigeria’s internal security and peace.
Yes, the Nigerian Army can be called upon to aid the police in providing internal security but never did the drafters of the Nigerian Constitution ever envisage that the military would be the primary providers of security and maintenance of the peace as we are currently experiencing in 34 states.
The flip side of the Nigerian Army as the primary provider of internal security is that instead of the singular focus on enemies of the Nigerian state, the military is now having to contend with the biases, negative influences, political and social pressures that accompany operating internally in a nation with over 300 ethnic groups.
Only recently, a former Chief of Army Staff, Lt Gen. T.Y. Danjuma, (retd.), pointedly accused the Nigerian Army of colluding, aiding and abetting armed militia he said were engaged in ethnic cleansing in Taraba and some other states, calling on those on the receiving end to resort to self-defence.
It goes without saying that if people resort to self-defence against their attackers and the Nigerian Army is perceived as colluding and aiding these attackers, then at some point, those resorting to self-defence could also turn against the Nigerian Army, a scenario that would see Nigeria spiralling straight into chaos and disorder.
These, of course, are outcomes of the natural interplay of factors that have thrust an institution established primarily to engage with external aggression against Nigeria into the forefront of providing internal security while half of the Nigeria Police is busy providing personal security to politicians, business persons and their businesses.
You read right, of the over 380, 000 members of the police force, a recent audit found that over 80, 000 were “ghost officers” while over 150, 000 of the remaining 300, 000 were assigned to the Very Important Persons Unit of the Nigeria Police to provide personal protection for the rich and the wealthy.
This means that the remaining 197, 150, 000 Nigerians are left with only 150, 000 policemen and women to meet their security needs and if you deduct from this number those on traffic, administrative and non-essential duties, there are probably not up to 75, 000 police personnel on actual policing duties maintaining the peace.