Northern governors demand change in strategy to tackle insecurity
THE Northern Governors’ Forum said it has agreed to new options at a meeting with service chiefs to address the recent spate of kidnappings in the region. Chairman of the forum and governor of Gombe State, Inuwa Yahaya, made this known to newsmen after the closed- door meeting on Thursday in Abuja with the National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu, and the Service Chiefs led by the Chief of Defence Staff, Gen. Christopher Musa.
Governors said to be present at the meeting, including Uba Sani of Kaduna State, Dauda Lawal of Zamfara, Babagana Zulum of Borno, Radda Dikko of Katsina, and Abdullahi Sule of Nasarawa State among others.
Yahaya noted that the meeting was convened to discuss and review strategies for tackling cases of insecurity in the region. He said: “The essence of the meeting as you can see is between the governors and the service chiefs and the NSA.
“So, it relates to security and you know security is very critical, especially that there were the recent issues of kidnapping in the Northwest and we are becoming so concerned that we need to discuss, review, and possibly take alternative options to what we have been doing before so that we can have a better result”.
He stressed the need for non- kinetic and kinetic approaches to address the remote causes of insecurity. “In fact, that is the best way to go because the issue is until we join the kinetic and non- kinetic approaches and already the service chiefs and all other security agencies have been doing their best.
“So what we need to do is to change the style, especially adding it with the non- kinetic approach, so that at the end of it when we join the two, we’ll have a better security situation in the country,” he said.
Some of the recent incidents of insecurity in the Northern parts of the country include the abduction of about 200 women and children who left the Internally Displaced Persons camps in search of firewood in Ngala, Borno state, on March 6.
Bandits on March 7, abducted 287 students from the LEA Primary and Junior Secondary School, Kuriga in the Chikun Local Government Area of Kaduna State.
Also, on Saturday, bandits kidnapped no fewer than 15 Tsangaya students in the Gidan Bakuso area of Gada Local Government Area of Sokoto State.