REVEALED: How Security Chiefs Secured Confidence of Senators
Details of the Tuesday closed session between the Senate and leadership of the nation’s security apparatuses indicate a marathon session in which the security chiefs led by the National Security Adviser (NSA), Nuhu Ribadu, gave lawmakers lowdown of fruits being yielded by effort of security agencies to tame insecurity in the country.
The NSA, ministers, and security chiefs took turns to give the lawmakers vivid accounts of their exploits and how that has led to averting any major terrorist attack since President Bola Tinub took over in May last year.
After the arrival of the security chiefs, President of the Senate Godswill Akpabio gave a short welcome remark where he spoke about the importance of the Senate’s summons of the security chiefs and the minister of finance, Mr Wale Edun.
Following the opening remarks, Senate Leader Opeyemi Bamidele moved a motion for the Senate to desolve into a committee of the whole and in closed session.
PRNigeria gathered that though the lawmakers went into the meeting with a lot of misgivings and apprehension, the security chiefs allayed their fears and earned their confidence.
It would be recalled that at the end of the marathon session, the Senate leadership expressed confidence in the leadership of the security sector and applauded their effort in addressing the security concerns.
A ranking legislator who was at the meeting and pleaded anonimy told PRNigeria that Ribadu, who gave the lead presentation, took the lawmakers through different components of the security challenges explaining how they met the situation and the changes so far.
He spoke about how wanton violence has significantly gone down, thus pushing down a number of casualties from attacks by armed groups.
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He said Boko Haram and ISWAP now resort to planting IEDs, showing that they were regressing from their comfort zones. Ribadu attributed the success in the fight against Boko Haram to the gallantry of troops and the hard work of the Borno State Government.
The NSA told the lawmakers that 20 gunrunning networks were smashed, and over 5,000 military grade weapons were seized and destroyed by government agencies.
The NSA told the lawmakers that sporadic incidences of kidnapping being reported in most parts of the country were pointers that security kidnapping and banditry have now evolved into economic crimes substituting armed robbery as an easy means of making money through criminal means.
He said the country is today witnessing a significant increase in oil production and ralative peace in the South-East region, which was hitherto bedevilled by activities of gunmen due to concerted military and non-military steps.
“The Chief of Air Staff also gave an excellent account of how the air component of the war complements the work of troops on the ground. He mentioned how they killed two key leaders of bandits Ali Kacalla and Yellow Janburos and how that has helped to halt interstate movement of bandits and logistics especially around Kaduna, Niger and Zamfara States,” the lawmaker said.
He recalled the Inspector General of Police also speaking about routing out criminals in the suburbans of Abuja and how his men have checkmated activities of one-chance criminals in the capital city.
Despite the satisfaction expressed by most lawmakers who sooetat the seesison, others pointed areas of operational lapses that deserve attention and urged the service chiefs to ensure harmony and cooperation for maximum success.
The lawmakers also tasked the minister of finance to prioritise the release of funds to security establishments.
By PRNigeria
