Stakeholders Lament  Continued Security Threats In North East; General Doubts “Repented” Insurgents

By Akinwale Kasali

Stakeholders at the ongoing 12th North-East Zonal Conference of State Directors of Security are perturbed by the continued spate of insecurity in the North East.

They also expressed grave concern over emerging security threats and criminalities capable of igniting a Boko Haram-style crisis across the region which has remained abated over the years.

In order to find a way to restore  peace and tranquillity in the North East, a three-day Conference waa organized to navigate the future and brainstorm on how the insurgency can be tamed.

The event is holding at the Borno State Command of the Department of State Services, DSS, and began on Monday, August 21.

Discussing challenges bedeviling the region, the Shehu of Borno, Alhaji Abubakar Ibn Umar Garbai Al-Kanemi, who spoke on the emerging criminalities and security threats in some communities in Borno State, recalled that such threats gave birth to the Boko Haram crisis because they were neglected.

“Security Chiefs should, therefore, identify and nip in the bud all such criminalities and security threats to avoid a recurrence of Boko Haram,” the Monarch, represented by one of his title holders, Alhaji Hassan Boguma, the Zanna Boguma of Borno, charged.

“Criminalities by the traumatised youth population are emerging from the rubbles of the Boko Haram insurgency,” the Borno State Commissioner of Police, Mohammed Lawal Yusuf, observed.

Citing the example of a growing group of miscreants called Malians, unleashing terror in the Maiduguri metropolis, the CP called for strengthened synergy and cooperation among all security agencies across the region to identify and nip in the bud all such criminalities.

The Commander of the 7 Division Garrison, Brig. Gen. Timothy Opurum, expressed reservations on the ongoing repentance and surrender of Boko Haram insurgents.

“They (repentant insurgents) surrender and lay down their arms, but who knows if they are up to some pranks?” he queried, suggesting, “so the post-insurgency period should even be more important to us the security agencies in terms of intelligence gathering and sharing to nip all threats in the bud.”

Declaring open the conference, Governor Babagana Zulum, represented by the Borno State Commissioner of Information and Internal Security, Prof. Usman Tar, concurred with all earlier speakers, expressing grief that new crimes and criminalities are emerging from the rubbles of Boko Haram.

“Inter-agency synergy and cooperation must be upheld because no individual agency can do it alone,” he charged, stressing, “There has to be strengthened synergy and cooperation to deal with the adversaries (insurgents and other criminals).”

The Conference, according to the Chairman of its organising committee, Hussaini Abdullahi, was “in furtherance of the sequence of such quarterly conferences introduced by the State Security Services to bring together directors within the  zone to deliberate on general and specific secury situation of respective states, share experience on identified basic and contemporary security threats affecting the sub-region, as well as adopt practical steps/measures in neutralising them.”