Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has urged the Federal Government to end all negotiations with terrorists and seek international support to tackle the worsening insecurity across the country.
Obasanjo made the call on Friday at the Plateau State Unity Christmas Carol and Praise Festival in Jos, where he criticised the government’s handling of the escalating wave of killings and abductions in the North.
“Nigerians are being killed, and our government seems incapable of protecting us,” he said. “If our government cannot do it, we have the right to call on the international community to do for us what our government cannot do for us.”
His remarks come amid a spate of violent attacks. In Niger State on Tuesday, bandits invaded Palaita community in Shiroro LGA and abducted 24 farmers, including pregnant women. Around the same time, about 20 people were kidnapped in separate incidents in Kano and Kwara states.
The latest raids add to earlier incidents, including the abduction of 26 schoolgirls from Government Girls Secondary School, Maga, in Kebbi State on November 17. In Kwara, 38 worshippers kidnapped from the Christ Apostolic Church, Oke-Isegun, Eruku, on November 18 were released only after the Federal Government negotiated with their abductors—an approach Obasanjo condemned.
In yet another attack on Tuesday, 10 people, including a pregnant woman, nursing mothers and children, were seized in Isapa community near Eruku.
Obasanjo also questioned why authorities continue to negotiate with criminals despite having access to modern surveillance and combat technology.
“Before I left office, we could identify anyone who committed a crime, but we lacked the capacity to take them out immediately,” he said. “Now we have the capacity — with drones, we can take them out. Why are we apologising? Why are we negotiating?”
The former President said Nigeria must adopt a more decisive strategy and, if necessary, bring in foreign partners capable of helping to dismantle the networks behind the rising insecurity.
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