Afenifere, the Pan-Yoruba socio-political group, on Friday asked President Muhammadu Buhari to declare bandits as terrorists and stop treating them with kids’ gloves.
The call comes one month after Justice Taiwo Taiwo of the Federal High Court in Abuja on November 26 granted an ex parte application by the Federal Government for Yan Bindiga (Hausa word for gunmen) and Yan Ta’adda (Hausa word for terrorists) to be declared as terrorists.
Up until now, the Federal government is yet to do so.
Nigeria is currently experiencing its worst peace-time insecurity, with armed gangs roaming the highways, cities, and countryside, kidnapping people for ransom.
These security challenges have become a war-like situation that calls for the recall of retired intelligent retired officers to beef up the efforts of security organs in the push to conclude the war, Afenifere said in a statement on Friday.
The statement was signed by Afenifere’s spokesman, Jare Ajayi., with the caption: Nigeria in war situation over insecurity: Afenifere calls on President Buhari to recall retired soldiers and seek help’.
It said: “It is disheartening that terrorists had the temerity to launch attacks near Maiduguri on Thursday, December 23, 2021, around the time the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of Nigeria, President Muhammadu Buhari, was visiting Maiduguri and parts of Borno State.
“Apart from the bomb blast that happened in Maiduguri, the Nigeria Immigration Services, also revealed in a letter to its border posts dated December 23, 2021, that terrorists from Mali plan to attack Abuja, Nigeria’s Federal Capital Territory.
“The above are aside kidnapping, killing, arson and burning of vehicles conveying people from one place to another as happened on Kaduna highway and in Borno and Katsina States, etc. recently. The near-daily occurrence of kidnapping in Ondo, Ekiti, Osun, Imo States among others is intolerable.”
“Within the period, retired intelligent officers be encouraged to report at the military formations nearest to them with a view to reintegrating them back into the system. Needed weapons and incentives must be provided just as the intelligence units within the security organs be rejigged to weed out the fifth columnists in the army.
“This, it can do successfully, by stopping to treat bandits and terrorists with kid gloves, by genuinely providing needed equipment to the army and other security agencies, by truly engaging the youths into ventures that would earn them a livelihood, by no longer treating some bandits and terrorists as sacred cows and by liberalizing the economy in such a way that the cost of commodities and services in the country would come down considerably,” Afenifere said.