TELL IT

By John Amoda THE Uyo Confab ought then to have this present condition of the Nigeria society as the reference of all its deliberations. It is a condition defined by the increasing ineffectiveness of government society wide-hence concerns expressed in terms of state failure or of a slide into anarchy and of the challenge to the existence of government defined by the Boko Haram insurgency. The impact of both challenges on each other defines the character of the Nigerian security challenge. As government is preoccupied with the JTFs, less attention is paid to the STFs that address the problem of societal disorder caused by armed groups. Equal attention, therefore, needs to be paid to both threats, threats from anarchy engineered by gangs that have developed into militias, and threats from the Boko Haram sect whose insurgency has developed into Islamic state formation civil war. Nigeria is now Mali writ large . The Uyo Confab as announced seemed convened to deal with the governance conseq...

By John Amoda THE Vanguard of Monday May 13, 2013 carries a story titled, "Terrorist may over-run Nigeria". In it, the Senate President, David Mark "warned ... that unless everybody comes together to tackle the security challenges, the perpetrators might over run the country… The Senate President who expressed grave concern over the continued killings and wanton destruction of property in the country argued that foreigners who might be accused of being sponsors of members of Boko Haram sect currently terrorizing some parts of the country could not succeed if Nigerians were not involved internally as willing tools for the deadly act". In the Sunday Vanguard May 12, 2013, Lt Colonel Sagir Musa wrote on the "Proliferation of small arms and light weapons" and observed that arms trafficking "is increasingly and dangerously becoming a transnational organised crime in Nigeria with Boko Haram's insurgency, re-emerging Niger Delta crises and escalating k...

By John Amoda THE Assembly described by the conveners of the confab on insecurity as the "national family meeting" was scheduled for July 2 and 3 at Uyo. It was also called a political summit on the future of Nigeria. The Vanguard Monday, June 24, 2013 titled its report thusly: Confab on Insecurity: Soyinka, Sule, Anyaoku, Clark, others storm Uyo The national family meeting has been reschulded to enable the conveners accommodate requests of those who want to be part of the Assembly of the Nation in Uyo. [caption id="attachment_387316" align="alignnone" width="412"] From left: Chief of Air Staff Air Marshall, Alex Badeh; Chief of Naval Staff, Vice Admiral Dele Ezeoba; and Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Dikko Abubakar, after a security meeting with President Goodluck Jonathan at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, on Friday.[/caption] The two day summit has as its theme: "National Security and Political Stability." According to the con...

By John Amoda ONE person’s atrocity does not excuse another’s and revenge is not the motive. It is good governance. It’s ridding yourself of the terrorist organisation so that you can establish a standard of law that people can respect. And that’s what needs to happen in Nigeria.” The above remarks show the consequence of analyses of misconduct by the opposing forces, Government and Boko Haram, BH, without focus on the course and nature of the conflict in Nigeria. The course is terrorism, not insurgency. BH terrorist operations make no distinction between combatants and non-combatants; between Muslims and Christians. BH terrorist operations are of dual purposes: *To destroy the capabilities of the Nigeria Government to wage counter-terrorism operations in Nigeria *To control and rule areas of Nigeria as bases for gaining more Nigeria territories that are to be brought under the BH government. The US criticism addresses the first of the two aims of the BH. The Government of Nigeria is ...

By John Amoda LAOLU  AKANDE writing from New York in The Guardian Tuesday June 18, 2013, reports that “President Barack Obama is stepping up America’s military strategy against global terrorism and that Africa is on the list of his targets. The U.S. had earlier this year established a drone base for the sake of dealing with Boko Haram terror threat in Nigeria, an ally of the U.S. in Africa. According to a letter sent to the Speaker of the House of Representatives and President Pro-Tempore of the Senate at the weekend, Obama informed the U.S. Congress that he had 'deployed combat equipped forces to enhance the counter- terrorism capabilities and support the counter- terrorism operations of our friends and allies, including special operations and other forces for sensitive operations in various locations around the world'. The letter dated June 14 and signed by Obama himself, disclosed under the sub-heading 'Military Operations in Niger in Support of U.S. Counter-Terrorism O...