 We're working to prevent terrorist attack in Lagos, Commissioner of Police has said. And the PDP Board of Trustees is to meet on Wednesday as they plan a peace panel. Well, this is Plus Politics. I am Mary Ann O'Call. Sickled to the threat by bandits to attack some states in Nigeria, including Lagos, the Commissioner of Police, Lagos Command, has placed the State Intelligence Bureau off the command on high alert. The NSCC also placed its State Command on Alerts following intelligence reports that elements of Boko Haram terrorists, as well as those of the Islamic states of West Africa province, ISWAP, have heightened plots to attack the nation's capital, Abuja, and five other states, including Lagos. In its reaction to the security threat, Lagos State Government said it was not aware of the threat. Well, joining us to discuss this is Barista Wilson S. Sanguedo. He is CPP National President's Association of Licensed Private Security Practitioners of Nigeria. It's so good to have you join us, Mr. Wilson. Thank you very much. Good evening. I'm happy to be here. Great. It's not every day we have the honour of having people like you on the conversation. You know, because I mean, I think the major headlines of the past few months is that of insecurity, if not kidnapping. But today, I do not necessarily want us to talk about the problems as we are all aware of what the problems are. Thank goodness if some of the abductees have regained their freedom as of today. But then let's talk about Lagos first and foremost. It's the economic capital of the country. And there are allegedly threats of insecurity that were put on high alert as it is. Ekiti State also is boosting some security based on the report of terrorist attacks that may or may not happen. But let's look at the homegrown problems in Lagos. I've heard people complain about influx of people, unknown persons under the bridges, under the flyovers, et cetera, et cetera. How can we as Lagotians guard against these threats because there are some that are homegrown and of course there might be some that will be coming from outside. But let's look within ourselves first and foremost. I think basically we must realize that each and every one of us is responsible for our own security. Anywhere we go as we move from place to place, we must have that at the back of our mind. Of course, we have the law enforcement agencies that are saddled with the responsibility of ensuring that our states are secure and the country is secure, but that the primary responsibility of ensuring that we are safe and secure lies with you and I. So that means we must have some level of security awareness. Everyone should pray, teenagers use the adults because that's what is going to help us at this very time in our country. So as we move from place to place, we must keep our eyes open, but also rely on our gut feeling, understand that's possible, that's possible everywhere. And as much as possible, we should try and limit our movement at night because most of the problems we have are put at night when our SPAT observation and our bridge to recognize what is happening around us because they are low. A lot of us have been attacked at night because before we know it, they are there or not. So this is the time for us to be extra careful. We must let our people, our family members know exactly where we are going to. This is not the time for telling our family members or our friends, I'm going somewhere. You must let them know where exactly are you going to. So if they have to look for you, they must have, they must not have to look for you. A lot of us book uber to a boat to move around. And what I always advise is always let your ride with somebody in your house. Let them know exactly where you are going to. God forbid, if you book an uber and somebody else comes up, how are you going to be traced? So the other part of the problem, basically, is that most of us just believe all is well, all is not well. In our various communities, we must be part of the security effort to ensure our communities remain safe. We've had distances of where some estates have been attacked. And the areas of concentration of the works, the criminal's term, are sub-targets. So when you are located in an area that is far from town, in a very pushy area, you must be part of the security effort in your community to ensure that your community remains safe. These are no ordinary times. This is the time for us to be focused on our security. If we are living in a community, if they are asking us to pay dues, pay dues so that we can get the best security hands. But in some of our most communities, when you ask people to pay dues, they go to sleep. But they only come to pay dues when the partner has his act. Because it's become very obvious that there are securities on the line. Let's not wait on the batteries that come to us before we start cooperating with our fellow members in our community. These are a time for us to know our neighbors. The one we see, things that are normal in our community, we must have police control numbers to call. Many of us, if they ask you, what are the police control numbers? Many of us don't know. So we must interact with the law enforcement dangers. Information, information gathering and study information are the right time, is very key for our survivors at this time. Let me backtrack and go to where everybody would expect that we start this conversation from. How did we get here? I'm asking this because the present administration rolled into office on the wings of making sure that they will deal with insecurity, especially Boko Haram. This was one of the reasons why many people floated out, flocked out rather, to vote for President Bahari. But here we are in 2022 looking for ways that we can protect ourselves. Recently, I think the Governor Massary of Katsina has said that we should all find ways to protect ourselves, put pots, pans, bite them if we can. The most ridiculous thing I've heard. We also remember that the governor of Zamfara at some point said, let's get weapons. We would acquire them for you if need be. And so I'm wondering, how did we get here to sink this load to a point where we're even asking the citizens to do things that are not constitutional? I think basically everybody took things for granted. The government took things for granted. You and I took things for granted. This is not the time for blame game. But then you need to also understand the poorest nature of our borders. Our borders are not secure. And that has been very challenging for as long as I can remember. And then when you have a station whereby anybody can walk into our country, we can't be checked, we can't be stopped. People can come with all sorts of arms, then become very difficult to check the influence of these criminal elements. Unfortunately, the criminal elements have worked in, driven in, moved in through our poorest borders into our country, into our various communities. They are actually in our midst. They live with you and I. Of course, they have their camps. That is where they plan and they carry out their strikes on us. And that is where we need to change the narrative now. This is not the time to blame the government. Of course, the government may not have done its best, but this is the time for us as a people to rise up and say enough is enough. We have what it takes to put this thing to an end if we are all determined to work together as a team. There is only one thing the government needs from us. That is information. By the time we start changing our attitude and we now become more security conscious and as we see something, we say something. But it's not enough to see something, say something, but not exactly where to pass that information also. The state security service is published over and over and over. If you have information, please send this information to this various headlight. We are ready to move into action immediately. There is also the situation of trust between citizens and security agents where people have reported cases and incidents. And then of course, these people were traced to, the information was traced back to the person who gave out this information. So there is that lack of trust between these two. How do we deal with that situation? Okay, there is an aspect that has to do with the criminal element where you have robberies, where you have attacks. And we also have the issue of bad elements everywhere. When you write first messages, they are here. And the police is one of the agents that will come out and they will, even though particular officers have done, have not done well, they take the back of their way to make sure they do research for officers. So my advice with Nigeria is don't be deterred. Don't be discouraged. Because of incidents you have seen, where some people you pass information and they put them back on the streets, you also need to understand how the criminal justice system works. It's very key, you know. There is this law, we say everybody is regarded as innocent until proven guilty. So at times all these criminals are arrested, they are charged to court, and on technical grounds they are released. Don't forget that even the criminals, they are so entitled to a lawyer to defend them. Even if they are not for the service of a lawyer, the government will provide them, we have the legal aid council that will provide them with the service of a lawyer free of charge. So technical grounds for these criminals can be released and they are back on the streets, but that should not deter us, please. Or you have information that can help the law enforcement agencies to carry out the activities, don't deny them of that information. It's very key, pass information to them and then leave them to do what they need to do. The SSS idea, the police idea, the military idea, they have various headlines that they advertise over and over. Please, let's take advantage of these headlines and I'm sure as we do that, because by the time we start getting tired and say okay pass information, they will not do anything, they are getting worse. Now we are talking about the solutions and part of the solution is don't be tired of giving the information to the law enforcement agents because you don't have anyone to give that information. You can't handle it yourself, so give the information to those that can handle it. I'm sure with what is happening, they will definitely do their best because that is very key, don't be discouraged. Let's talk about travelling. A lot of people are afraid of travelling now because you do not know what's going to happen on the freeway. We recently heard about the kidnappings in different parts of the country. There have been attacks in the Southeast. We also heard that recently. But people have to move, businesses have to continue in that regard. What needs to be done? Again, I like to always ask this question, have we ever had it this bad, so much so that it seems like we all have to resolve to self-help. When we have security votes for governance in all the 36 states, we also have security agents. We have a chief of defence staff, a chief of army staff. We have the DSS, like you rightly stated. We have the mobile police officers. We have the normal police officers. I mean, we have so many security agents on the ground. But it seems very difficult for this information to be used because I don't want to believe that the security agents in Nigeria do not know where these people are or where they're going in and coming out from. There should be intelligence. What have we done? What has the security agencies done with the intelligence that has been on the ground? Even the media has had wind of some of these intelligence. But we don't see anything happening. Have we ever had it this bad in the country in terms of insecurity? I keep on saying basically that when we're going to have a change in governance and the turn of the administration of one government is coming to an end, this will definitely get worse. It happened in the time of the former president and he had to delay elections by one month. Within that one month, he actually brought the terrorist elements to their knees. But at that point in time, people were tired and said, enough is enough. Let's try something else. Between that and the next election, we're likely to go, we're likely to have an upsurge in crime. I call on the government security agencies. This is for them to work harder than ever before. But we as a people also must not be tired of giving better information to the government of the day. I believe as the elections are approaching, we're going to have more criminal incidents. And I believe the government will also do its best to make sure that they bring the crime rates to a manageable level. The government has its role to play. We as a people also have a role to play. But there's also something that we also forget in which we also need to look at. Now, in the first countries, the first line of defence is at the private gas. In those countries where the private gas are armed, they become the first layer of defence. And it frees up a lot of government officials. It frees up more of the military personnel to carry out their quantities. When you look at the number of policemen, one-third of those policemen are involved in VIP duties. They are involved in duties that are not normally regarded to as core police duties. As the president of the Association of Licensed Privacy, we have a draft bill we are working on. We are pushing for our gas across the country to be allowed to carry fire out. Of course, we have instances of where something comes up. If not even encouraging, they are also going to carry out. But that should not be the question. Let us free up, let us free up more policemen. Let us free up more soldiers to carry out their quantities. One of the ways we can do that is align our gas. We have about four million gas. The total number of law enforcement and military serving personnel across the country are not up to one million. Four million train guards are available to the government to assist in reducing the crime rate as it were. What is your take on state policing? Will it in any way help? I mean, we have seen paramilitary, we have seen states come up with their own security outfits. We have seen Amatecum, we have seen the one in the north. We have seen the I beg your pardon, in the southeast. What difference has it really made in terms of helping our state policing or the idea of state policing? You see, when I saw that we had the original outfits coming up, I knew that it may be very difficult for them to get far. For them to get far, they must be integrated into the national security architecture. Until that happens they will not go too far. You know, if the issue of state police you ask yourself this question why is the government hesitant in allowing this to work? Because they believe that maybe the state governments may use those state police for their personal advantage. So they prefer the police force that is centrally controlled as it were. But we need to see that as a nation and agree on the type of policing that will work for us. But committee policing can work. But for it to work and be effective, everybody within that framework must understand their role, the role that they must play. Outside the country, they get a lot of information about criminal elements operating within their environment. Everybody understands their role and it starts from when they are young. Their level of security awareness starts building up from when they were young. So we also need to go back to the drawing board. At the level of children that are nursery, primary school, secondary school, university level, to ensure that there is proper security and leadership. In some parts, in a place like Israel, everybody in Israel is trained to clarify and they are regarded as soldiers. So everybody knows their role. That's a country where they don't have too many people. But their dedication to their country is something that you imagine that because of the way they train their children from when they were young. So we also need to adopt some of those practices because that's what we actually get out of this. We should see security as a business. Everybody's business should not be restricted only to the government security agencies. The government security agencies are not telling us the number of people they are losing. I don't know where the number of people have been killed. They won't tell you. Because when you go into the military sign, it's like a covenant to sign to protect your country. And there wasn't a lot of policemen that paid the supreme price. But on our part we also need to support these people. I know they may not be giving us the best but the more we support them, the more they will come out and they will do their best. I know they have bad elements. But let's not use the bad element to judge the entire law enforcement agency. I've had interaction on the highest level with the Royal Police with the Department of State Security and I know they are determined to ensure that Nigeria still remains safe. But we need to support them. We don't have any other Department of Justice that we only have one. We don't have any other police that we only have one. But we need to support these people and make sure that they live up to their responsibilities. We can't wait to go. Let's talk about what's at the core of this insecurity because there's always that saying that if you cannot treat the root cause of the problem then you can't just put a plaster on the cancer. What do you think is at the core of this insecurity that has grown and become a hydro-headed monster because it's one thing in one region it's another in another region. What do you think that needs to be done? I mean because it looks like Mr. President has recently been closer to say that he's done his best and of course he also had given off the vibe that he cannot wait to go and rest. So where does that leave us as Nigerians? And again, what should be the root cause of the problem that we should be tackling in order to drain the swamp? We look at the first root cause look at poverty. There's a lot of poverty in the land. And so most of us that any come we know how much we spend on the monthly basis. I've heard people saying that they don't know how long they can cope. When you have a solution of somebody earning about 100,000 or even 200,000 a month unable to feed his family then what of those that are any 30,000 a month? How do you get feed? I have someone telling me, calling me that now they only eat once a day. And what food do they eat? You will cry when you see some food. They are meal is just that's what they eat. So maybe they take soup and they take rice once a week. Because people also have to devise ways of seeing how they survive. So poverty is infested. The poverty level is high. The rate of exposure is high. Look at the poverty now. It's getting very high. And people are speculating that before December it may hit $1,900. As the inflation rate is rising poverty will be on the increase. Communists will not be making profit. They will want to cut or they want to lay off workers and all that. So poverty is one level that may be the cost of a present issue. They also have the influx of the criminal elements that are caught from outside the country. They are virtually everywhere. And they are greater than the guys that are pastoralists where they are actually not. Because for example we will tell you that the original pastoralists we know carry guns, they just carry stick. But this world they carry sophisticated weapons. So you ask yourself are these the same ones that we always knew and the answer is no. And when you hear them speaking they are not from outside the country. But we already got it wrong from the beginning. They are making our borders porous and they already came in and they are already with us. After that we want to go right to Canada where they carry you and they talk. You know these people are not from this country. They are already with us. They are not of the government with the idea of banning Okadas. You know if you ban Okadas those people are off the streets so you think. But they are going to look for other ways of any income and they make the crime rate may be triple if that does happen. Because on those people that ride Okada are people that are doing it just to survive. After that you see people from the north coming here with the means of any living. Probably believe there is more money in the south. So those are some of the issues. You also have graduates that have finished school. They don't have work. And the issue of court is in this. You have court groups at the primary school level. You have court groups at the secondary school level. You have court groups at the university level. Some parents because of this knowledge have taken their children to private schools thinking that there are no court groups in the private school. And the private school is even worse. So we are in trouble. Finally do you think that the government of President Bahari has failed Nigerians in dealing with or in keeping the promise of securing us. Especially now that we are going up for elections. Can we say that the government has failed? The expectation for this government was very high. The mantra of change was what you and I cut off with to ensure that this government comes into power. This government still had an opportunity between now and May to change it with. Former President Jonathan did that in one month. This is a narrative but people got tired. My advice to these government is they cannot wait on this month of the election to start doing what they should be doing now. They still have time on their hands and they are crying and they want a signature it is the primary responsibility of any government to be part of the world to better provide security for their citizens. That is the primary responsibility and one of the government of the disability side responsibility. The hope of the average Nigerian for this government to be revived. I want to say thank you Wilson. The President of the Association of Licensed Private Security Practitioners of Nigeria. Thank you so much for being here with us and having this conversation. Thank you very much. When we return we will be discussing the PDP's plans to bring all agreed members of the party together. Stay with us.