By our reporter|Nigeria’s Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo on Tuesday agreed that there is an urgent need to constantly review the country’s security architecture.
Osinbajo agrees that the conventional means of dealing with the security challenges in the country fas failed following Saturday’s killing of over 43 rice workers in Zabarmari community of Borno State by Boko Haram insurgents.
Osinbajo, who made the disclosure in Lafia during a one-day official visit to Nasarawa State, said the Muhammadu Buhari administration was ready to put new ideas on the table in order to secure the country.
According to him, efforts to secure the nation required “a lot more of local intelligence and the community policing”, stressing that security agencies could swiftly attend to challenges if necessary information was provided on time.
Osinbajo said, “As the President said, these groups of people have acted insanely in such a dastardly manner, killing innocent people, people who had gone to their farms to work.
“I spoke to the Governor, Governor Babagana Zulum and the former Governor, Senator Kashim Shettima to express my condolence, but more importantly, to try and think through ways of dealing with this kind of random attacks.
“It’s important to understand also that we will probably need to keep reviewing the conventional means of dealing with some of these issues, these security challenges, especially the randomness.
“Which is why the President has said that he is taking a serious look at how to deal with the issues, especially the randomness: some insane person goes into a place and shoots people, that is not the sort of thing that you are prepared for conventionally.
”We have to do a lot more local intelligence and some of the community policing efforts we are planning on, so that information is supplied faster, especially at the local level and then a reaction will then be possible.”
“It is a major tragedy; it’s a very unfortunate thing and our hearts are with the family of those who were killed in such a terrible manner.
“We are very confident and the Federal Government will continue to do what it needs to do especially in terms of trying to ensure security in the Northeast and all over Nigeria.
“You’ve heard the President and what he has to say, especially some of the new ideas around security and the security architecture which we are trying to put in place. We will get there.”
The Vice President who was in the state to commission the Nasarawa State Infectious Disease and Research Centre (NASIDRC), declared that the country has the resources to be great.
He said, ” Nigeria has all it takes to be the best in the world, we have the talents, men and women, vision and the resources it takes to be great.
” Governor Abdullahi Sule has shown leadership qualities by continuing the work initiated by his predecessor, Governor Umaru Tanko Al-Makura behind Dalhatu Araf Specialist Hospital (DASH) Lafia.
“Nasarawa State is not by any means the wealthiest state in the country. In fact, if you look at what Nasarawa State earns and what is allocated to it, it certainly doesn’t come anywhere near the top one third. I call for the policy to be sustained.”
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