Security
By Anthony Isibor
PROF Anya O. Anya has said that the country is fighting a dangerous war with the military in full battle gear. Anya, who was a former Director-General of the Nigerian Economic Summit Group, told Realnews in an exclusive interview in Lagos that although the country continues to live in denial, the war is real and can only be won by recalling all the retired army generals because of their knowledge and wealth of experience.
He noted that the war is even more dangerous because the country is dealing with non-state actors, “people who are not organized and should not be near government and not even in government, so they are on their own and what makes it worst is the fact that from what we are now hearing, many of these people are from outside of Nigeria, so, it’s not an internal war, it’s in fact an external war.”
“Nigeria as we speak is at war, but Nigeria is also in denial. There is nowhere in the world that you have so many people being killed each day either by bandits, insurrectionists or kidnappers or whatever, and you think the society is normal, no way!
“So we are at war, the difference is simply that we are pretending that we don’t know we are at war,” he said.
According to him, Borage’s statement that at first 20,000 and later on 40,000 people were brought into the country from outside Nigeria to deal with any eventuality after the 2015 election, points towards the war. ‘He implied that the APC did not expect to win.’
“The implication is that if you do not expect to win and you have brought in armed people of that magnitude, then you are going to declare war literarily and make the place ungovernable.
“Well, unfortunately, according to what he said also, it turns out that at the end, the politicians, who brought them in abandoned them. So they have to fend for themselves, and in fending for themselves, they found this was a lucrative country where there was no order and you can do what you please, and they discovered ransom. And that’s why we are where we are.
“Remember there was a time he even said he have them money. In other words, he has been involved in negotiation with them but obviously not at the national level, but at the level of his state. Yes, I expect that El’Rufai knows about this.
“Don’t forget that if a Nigerian man in any authority encourages non Nigerians to create mayhem in Nigeria, it is a treasonable offense so, it is not something you admit to easily.
“And that is why if you look at the way this has been handled by the present government, they talk tough and nothing happens because there is ambivalence, ambivalence because these were their one time friends now turned enemies and certainly gone beyond what they expected,” he said.
Prof Anya, who is also a member of the ‘Burdened Elders’, a group of concerned elders proffering solutions to the many challenges bedeviling the country through advocacy and advisory roles, also agreed that the current security architecture is compromised.
He, however, added that for the country to get out of the situation, there was need to end the blame game and work collectively by mobilizing all the retired military personnel, who are still capable of being in the service.
“But there must be an answer, and the answer is to recognize that to get ourselves out of here, we are no longer going to say who did that and who did not do that in the past.
“We just have to face the danger that we are in and return peace and reasonable order into our country, and it involves all of us, and that is why I say we are at war. So we must mobilize for that.
“If you can organise the retired military men in all the zones of Nigeria, you have a sizeable army of command sector, then, the chief of defense staff can now coordinate that. Otherwise, pretending that the military as it is now can return us to stability, well we still have time, but it may go from bad to worse.
However, if you bring in the retired military men and organise them, the quality of military decision making, strategic planning will increase because you have a pool of very experienced people, some of whom have even taking part in the war. You have that resource, he said.
According to Anya, military men don’t retire. When they do retire, they are placed on reserve and can be recalled for service to the nation. The first recourse will be to recall the army of retired military men from all over the country.
“In a national emergency, we can’t afford the privilege of choosing who and who you window in. that is when the president as the commander in chief will use his powers to organise.
“There are many generals we retired over the last 20 years, and you start from them.
“They can still be called upon to give national service when they have to. But the important is where we are.” he added.
AI.
First published – Apr. 18, 2022 @ 14:44 GMT
Tags: APC Prof Anya O. Anya
