Govt recalls IG from U.S. over insecurity

Posted by admin Boko Haram, Nigerian Police, Top Stories Wednesday, June 29th, 2011

PRESIDENT Goodluck Jonathan has recalled the Inspector- General of Police, Hafiz Ringim, who has been visiting the United States (U.S.), to contend with the alarming insecurity at home.

Confirming the recall, Nigeria’s Ambassador to the U.S., Prof. Ade Adefuye said Ringim’s planned public lectures and meetings in the U.S. had all been cancelled as he was billed to leave for Nigeria later yesterday.

Also, the Nigerian Army is set to respond to the security challenge posed by the violence that has been unleashed on the nation by the Boko Haram group and others.

The response is anchored on a plan to set up some specialised units as part of efforts to contain growing violent activities like those of the Boko Haram.

Adefuye did not disclose the cause of the IG’s recall home, but official sources say the President may hold an urgent meeting today or tomorrow with all his service chiefs on the state of security in the country.

That meeting may be followed by another one where the service chiefs may be meeting with the Senate, which has also asked the top security chiefs to explain the state of security in the nation. But the Senate has not fixed a time for its meting with the chiefs.

There has been concerns about the timing of Ringim’s visit since his arrival in the U.S. on Sunday night considering the persistence of the Boko Haram attacks in parts of the country, especially after the June 16 bombing of the police head office in Abuja. While away, world bodies including the European Union have been calling for an effective response from the Federal Government against the bombings and the perpetrators to avoid a state of impunity.

Although previous media reports had said the Inspector-General’s visit to the U.S. capital was for talks with U.S. officials on the security situation in Nigeria, sources said the President believed that the IG’s attention was more needed at home.

The IG was supposed to complete his trip to the U.S. by weekend as he had planned a five-day working visit, having arrived on Sunday and planned meetings with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and also expected to hold talks with State Department officials.

Besides, the IG was to deliver a keynote address on: “The challenge of police reform in Africa” at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), in Washington DC today, while he was also billed to meet with the influential Corporate Council for Africa on this trip.

The Chief of Army Staff, Lt.-Gen. Onyeabor Azubike Ihejirika, said yesterday that the army was also modifying its training modules, laying more emphasis on mental agility than on physical prowess as a requirement for enlistment and advancement within the system.

Though the army boss did not elaborate on the many specialised units coming, he told journalists in Abuja as part of the activities kicking off this year’s Nigerian Army Day Celebrations (NADCEL) that a dog unit would soon be part of the specialised arms that would assist troops in doing an excellent job while on internal security operations.

The NADCEL, which is used to commemorate the setting up of the Nigerian Army in 1863, holds on July 6 of every year. This year’s event will hold in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State.

Ihejirika said that the army had modified its training programmes in order to emphasize mental alertness as a major component of its operations.

According to him, “we are going to establish some dog units. Dogs are loyal and have far-reaching effects. It will complement our efforts (especially with internal security operations.) The training of our soldiers today will be a lot modified. Efforts will be more on the mental agility than on physical agility. Towards this, we have even lowered our height requirements so that we will take shorter people who are more mentally alert.”

He noted that for the special units coming into place, “already, some officers will travel abroad while others will be trained locally to man the new units. Briefly, a number of units and new training programmes are lined up and we have started implementing them.”

Gen. Ihejirika, who spoke on the Boko Haram threat during the interaction with the media, said that though the army had deployed in Borno State as part of its assistance to the civil authorities, “the operation in the Borno State operations is not an outright operation. The involvement of the army is because of the sophistication of the type of weapons we use and the special training given to personnel.”

He stated that the tactics of the Boko Haram were new in that “the terrorists live among the people. They need to be exposed in order for them to be arrested. Sometimes, they may not have the weapons in their individual houses. It is possible they have hideouts. Ninety per cent of the job in internal security operations like the one in Borno State require intelligence gathering and patriotism. Nigerians must come out and expose these chaps. And I assure all Nigerians that any information given out will be handled professionally.

“The Boko Haram violence thrives because there are several unpatriotic Nigerians who are aiding and abetting them. No one should be intimidated by the so-called Boko Haram. They are cowards. If they were not, why don’t they operate in the open? For us, the issue is that people are being killed unnecessarily. And people are committing crimes for no just cause. This cannot be left to continue. They have only capitalised on the general complacency of Nigerians to do one or two things they have been able to do. They are perpetrating criminality that should not be given any chance under any guise. Nigerians should be more security conscious. Security could be beaten in various ways. And Nigerians are gift-conscious. You could be made to carry a bomb without your knowing it. Explosives could be in liquid form.”

He said that that part of the solution to the operation of insurgent groups and other criminal elements was “to awaken the security consciousness of Nigerians. That is very important. If a market woman sees a bag dropped in her stall, she should be able to alert security personnel. If there are jobless people riding big cars, people should ask questions.

-Guardianwp_posts