Yusuf Bello| President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday said that the country’s land borders wil be reopened soon.
The President who made the disclosure during Tuesday’s security meeting with Nigerian Governor’s Forum in Abuja, explained that the closure of the nation’s land borders was part of the efforts by the government to control the smuggling of weapons and drugs into the country.
Buhari said, “Now that the message has sunk in with our neighbours, we are looking into reopening the borders as soon as possible.”
According to a statement from presidential spokesman, Garba Shehu, Buhari also asked the 36 state governors to work more with traditional rulers and community members to improve local intelligence gathering that would aid the work of security agencies.
The President, after listening to presentations by a governor from each of the six geo-political zones on their specific security challenges, noted that in the old order, communities identified newcomers and passed information to constituted authority.
Buhari who informed the governors that the sub-region is no longer safe, more so with the collapse of the regime of the former Libyan leader, Muammar Gaddafi, and the cross-border movement of weapons and criminals, however, said that his government had done well in the North East and South-South.
The President described the reports of illegal refineries and the blowing up of pipelines in the South-South as worrisome and asked the governors to stop local rogues from sabotaging oil installations.
On the issue of banditry and kidnapping reported in each of the geo-political zones, he said, “Security is important, and we must secure the whole country.
“We are thinking very hard on the issue of kidnapping. We will make it possible for the military to get to the bandits and kidnappers and eliminate them.”
Nigeria it will be recalled closed its land borders in August 2019 to curtail the increasing rate of smuggling of contrabands and other items into the country.
Leave a Reply