 The campaign season is upon us as we all know and safety security is top on the priority list as there are There has been a war of wards between the APC and the PDP as both of them have said One or the other is behind the banditry in the Northwest and the country in general Well, our focus is on what government and politicians should be doing to quell this situation going forward joining us to discuss This is security experts Kabir Adamu. Thank you very much for joining us. Mr. Adamu Thank you, Marianne. Great. Great There are so many things that you know when you talk about the issue of insecurity it's a potpour of issues whether it's kidnapping It's Burko Haram on the other hand. It's banditry. I mean we're seeing it all over the place a few Days ago what it was the case anymore stage where a monarch was kidnapped killed and then dumped in The village square. We've also seen one that was kidnapped and and he was released We've seen something similar happen in Zamfara state, but good news is we've also seen that the the Air Force has Neutralized two very notorious You know Gunmen in fact terrorists let's call them that in the same Zamfara state So there are pluses and there are minuses, but let's start with the challenges of fighting this insecurity There's especially the ones that we've been facing lately in Nigeria Thank you once again and Marianne and happy new year to you the challenges frankly the nature of the Security issues we're dealing with They are asymmetric. They are urban and They are enemies that live with us that sometimes You know what and the same with that the society so a little bit difficult for You know conventional approach where you know the enemy is Aside he or she has declared himself and is attacking you in this instance these are You know part of the city of the citizenry in certain instances an industry has even emerged that has different levels of participation what we call a value chain So specifically when you when I'm talk when we use kidnapping as an example you would Identify that there are several levels of Participants within that industry called kidnapping and most of these participants are individuals that are living together with us and So that makes it a little bit difficult, but that is not to excuse the failure of Especially the criminal justice system to arrest and punish offenders. So that's a challenge number two the various You know structural deficiencies within our criminal justice system that has prevented the arrest and the punishment of offenders Our criminal justice system is in in summary divided into three the law enforcement component which includes Agencies like the police that are supposed to arrest and gather evidence and then present that to the second Level, which is the judicial system now the judicial system is supposed to look at the evidence Is that have been presented by the law enforcement and then prosecute the the suspect as it were and then the last one are the correctional Services now if you look at all these three aspects you very well know that they are they all have their issues There is none of them that I'll pick that I can spend the next 24 hours discussing the various challenges they have so you can understand how The deterrence element within our criminal justice system is no longer Existing the third one and which is for me the most important challenge is our value system that has more or less Dropped to a level that is scary The average young person and in fact most adults too have failed or lost the capacity to differentiate between good and bad they commit offenses without Bordering to you know, even ask if this what what they are doing is good or bad People drive against traffic people, you know bring in things that are illegal They attempt to sell them people, you know deal in guns They deal in drugs all in the name of hustling and looking for money without even considering that those things are illegal All they talk about is risk without asking whether that is fun So the next thing is to ask why did our value system fail like that and I've attempted to look at the four Major shapers of value within the society starting from the family unit that Frankly has it's not performing that responsibility of current effectively Impacting good values to a lot of children and so these children come up and end up being terrorists end up being bandits But these they are not ghosts. They are children that come from within us. The second aspect is the school system I recently traveled to, you know, let me not mention the state But the guy who picked me from the airport with an Uber driver is a teacher And I had him making a phone call. He was supposed to be supervising an exam and by God He had collected money from the parents of the pupils and he was allowing them So the person who he had asked to stay in his place was helping him to allow them to actually chip during that exam And when I confirmed anyone that he felt it was okay and accept if we decide to kid ourselves This is something that is commonplace. How many parents actually bribe or pay, you know The school administration or even the those who are invigilated to allow their kids to you know, still and not so What do you expect that child to grow up to be and the third element is our religious institutions that are also Contribute the shaping the value system and we all know, you know, there are so many issues affect affecting them If I give you a plane their rule even where the first two the family And the schools fail then the religious bodies would be at least able to correct certain aspect And then the last one and I hate this baby I hope you don't drive me away if the media the media too has a Critical element in correcting values because based on what what you put out there But unfortunately today whether fortunately or unfortunately We're in an era where the media has become so amorphous. You have the mainstream media. You have social media And so that contribution to shaping Values has also been affected by by this this aspect So in a nutshell, these are the challenges and that is why it has become extremely difficult For come to use conventional means to address the security challenges that we have at the moment Let's talk about the politicization of the whole issue because when I started I did say that it's been a war of warts between the sitting Ruling all progressive Congress and of course your position the PDP. It's been oh, you're behind it No, you're behind it. You seem to be feeling it. No, you're not the one You know, so it looks more like this issue could have been easily dealt with Without the politicization of the issue again Let's talk about the fact that when it comes when it's close to election season We start hearing these politicians wax lyrical and come up with ideas that they think are very Novell to deal with this insecurity as opposed to making it happen. I want to know as a security person What should be? Forming the conversations as we get ready or we gear up to pick someone whoever whether it be at state levels at Senatorial levels or even at the presidency level What should be the things that be part of the conversations that they're having that would make us want to vote these people into office? It's as opposed to this war of warts that we're seeing today Brilliant question Marianne and I at the risk of you know Put it out there as something that would scare a few persons it where This is just the beginning. It's going to get worse in the era of social media and artificial intelligence We've seen instances across the world and in fact we've been told that even in Nigeria. They did it in the 2019 elections So it's going to be get worse in the 2023 elections They are going to bring in AI at artificial intelligence that will create bots and several other You know artificial intelligence platforms on social media to for Propaganda and this is going to be on both sides The government is going to do that where in an attempt to show success and then the opposition is also going to do that So Facebook and Twitter and name them all the social media platforms Unfortunately are going to have a barrage of this You know capabilities And today in today's world there are several Institution several agencies that are selling these capabilities. So any politician who you know has done a little bit of research Like I said, they did it in 2019. So I am almost certain that they're going to do it in 20 23 as well Now what capabilities do we have as a country to monitor that and to counter it now? I'm sure the Smart listener would say well the government is also going to do the same thing. So it's going to be a balance of the capabilities as it were But that's not what should bother us. What should bother us as Nigerians is what do we want? And that is why I love your question What we want is someone who will come up and show to us in clear terms that this is the strategy He or she wants to pursue to address the security challenges in the country and show in clear terms the Key performance indicators the measure the monitoring and evaluation systems that will be in place In that strategy that would allow us that will allow the media to now say, okay This is what you've promised. This is how are we going to measure you now? He or she will provide the key performance indicators that would allow every Nigerian to say okay We didn't six months of his appointment this and this he has been able to do and one of the best indicators of that is In 2021 about 10,000 Nigerians were killed You know due to all of the security challenges now anyone who in real terms want to reduce or contain the Security challenges in the country should bring down to that to at least below 5,000 then we can now clap for him and say okay 10,000 I killed in 2021 in 2022 5,000 and then in 2023 less than 1,000 and then eventually but where we don't have those type of Key performance indicators those type of measurement metrics in within our Security architecture that it makes it almost impossible. So what we do is we ask Critical questions we demand for these types of strategies that will show in clear terms what Individuals intend to do and I can for free, you know offer these two would be politicians We have the drivers of insecurity poverty unemployment You know our the week criminal justice system that I mentioned Weapons proliferation the climate change issues porous borders name them So anyone who wants to address security challenges must show in clear terms how he or she Intends to address all of these drivers and more importantly the security sector governance The soft side that I've mentioned must be complemented by this other hard site Which is the kinetic issues that you hear politicians mention But the security sector governance that would allow us to have a democratic Security arrangement where the ethos of their functions is get at protecting us You and I and the every Nigerian and more importantly respecting our human rights as well as Implementing a system where even the of the last person that is in my village is able to have a sense of Belonging in terms of protection for security. So any politician who does not do that believe me is going to repeat What has been done in the last probably 40 50 years that has led us to where we are at the moment And so the only is on us to as we say Nigeria shine our eyes and make sure we ask this critical questions In terms of strategies in terms of policies in terms of key performance Indicators in terms of metrics that would allow us to measure Performances within the security sector You mentioned some things that I have been brooding over You know porous the porousness of our borders most importantly Because over the years and I'm talking about from 2014 down to 2021 we've seen guns continuously come into the country and we know it they start coming into Into the country at about this time. We've even seen some a few of them in 2021 guns Continuously coming into the country. Where are these guns going to we never see a follow-up on these stories Where they're emanating from who or what companies, you know, we're responsible for shipping them We never we just hear about it The press covers it when you know, it's uncovered and then that's it We hear nothing else about it again the porousness of our borders. I've heard it since I was a teenager Oh, our borders are porous, but nothing has been done I'm asking this question especially because the president of this country as we speak is the Only person that campaigned that he was going to make sure that insecurity becomes a thing of the past When he comes into office, it's almost a year left in his tenor for him to say goodbye And can we really say that mr. President has done anything to deal with this or even scratch the surface? secondly the president was just on channels television this evening and he was asked a question about the issue of grazing roots and He stands unchallenged on that issue. He seems not to be shifting ground Does the body language of the president look like that of a person who wants us to go back to a place of some form of sanity? If some of these issues he still seems to be headstrong about them So yes Overall, I would say the president has demonstrated the willingness and desire to address Security challenges in the country. We know for instance that the 42 times that he has run and I have been elected Security is part of the three-part agenda that he has put forward to Nigeria and a part upon which Nigeria has voted in We also know that he has attempted to look at the challenges within the security Architecture and in an attempt to address them. So one of the challenges is our moribund policies One of what one of the first things he tried to do is to review those policies And then we've also seen a hint an attempt by him to procure Weapons all of these are issues that you know if you're going to score him you score him highly But the challenge is this how has all of these things that he has attempted to do Translated into a reduction in fatalities and that is where the each the difficulty is frankly not not not so much Despite all of these huge We have seen a major reduction in fatalities. Yes, if you compare it to pre-Buhari time There has been a reduction. I will go back to 2014 precisely the data for 2013 when we saw a fatality rate of about 13,400 they are about for one year alone And it was that period that the group called Jamal to listen a little the world you had became the deadliest Terrorist group in the world now all of that has changed. There has been a reduction But I like I told you 10,000 people are still dying in Nigeria These are people's mothers people's fathers sisters brothers husbands wise children and it is you know Absorbed it is a situation that need to stop We cannot even if the figure is 500 it is still Absorbed we cannot have in a situation where in a year those number of people are dying So the the investment all of these successes that I've mentioned frankly Dwarfed by the fatalities that I've mentioned So what I hope to see is the two major areas and I'm hoping that President Wari, I'm hoping he's listening to us. We've heard it on channels So he's probably not going to listen to it But I hope I hope you play it for what a time and he gets this listen to it two major areas and improve on accountability One of my major worries in 2001 and even before then is we've not seen instances where Failures breaches within our security you know analyzed and That is not Fountain that we should condone where you have instances where there is a clear breach of trust or even a dereliction of duty Then the individual responsible for that must be penalized. So as an example, you talked about the border, which is your second question I know that the two major agencies that have responsibility for border protection is The immigration and the customs in Nigeria and you're aware that the president has even instituted an Extraordinary measure that has affected several of our borders But in spite of all of that we're still seeing weapons being ferried in into the country And I'm not aware that anyone within the hierarchy of the customs has been penalized now That is what I mean We have to have a system where if you fail to live up to the expectation of your office Then then you are penalized otherwise what we do is to encourage You know people to continue to fail to meet our expectations And for lack of a better word to continue to fail us as a country and that is why people are dying where there is a clear inability to meet the expectations of the office that you are heading and for God's sake you should be penalized So that's number one number two. We need to introduce Good auditing as well as monitoring and evaluation Systems within our security architecture now the only way that you can ensure You show plenty that the individual in question is doing well or he's not doing well It's when you have good audit systems good Monitoring and evaluation systems that use metrics and in today's world is very easy. I talked about AI I talked about that several other and technological innovations that would allow us to introduce this You know systems in place that would allow both the executive arm of government and the legislative arm of government to exercise Some form of oversight and measure the performances of these individuals so that quarterly we can You know ask for improvement if one of the adjust as an example if we pick the police Kidnap is one of the things that has worried us and I can tell you that in 2001 over 4000 Nigerians were abducted now if we are doing this type of evaluation that I mentioned Quarterly the inspector general of police will come and present and show to the both Executive arm as well as the legislative arm that look from January to April This is the number of persons that were abducted and this is what we have done to reduce the abduction and where there is no Success then they know clearly that he has not succeeded and they can ask him why if they give him what he needs To perform and he still doesn't perform then for God's sake by the second quarter They change him. So this is what metrics and many monitoring and evaluation would do to us and that currently is absent So these students that I mentioned Would would definitely if mr. President in the next, you know one yes If and a few months that he has it is able to do these students I bet you would see a change if not, then I'm sorry Unfortunately would look back and you know, it would still be the same old thing We still see this number of fatalities that we're seeing that is worrying us Well on that very sad note because unfortunately, I do not know how What we the president could not do in four years or five years would be done in a year But I want to thank you. Kavira Adamu is a security expert and he's been speaking with us on plus politics Thank you very much for speaking with us. Thank you for having me. All right. Well. Thank you all for staying with us It's been plus politics on plus TV Africa. Don't forget. You can watch this show again If you go on our YouTube channels, which is plus TV Africa and plus TV Africa lifestyle. I am Mary Annacol. I'll see you tomorrow