- Dr. Olisa Agbakoba, former NBA President, met with President Tinubu, urging a shift to irregular tactics in tackling Nigeria’s insecurity
- Agbakoba stressed the need for a change in strategy from conventional warfare to irregular warfare to effectively combat insecurity
Dr. Olisa Agbakoba, a renowned lawyer and former President of the Nigerian Bar Association, has stated that insecurity in Nigeria can only be defeated through irregular tactics by security agencies.
The lawyer stated that he had met with President Bola Tinubu to discuss the country’s worsening insecurity and warned him that regular mechanisms would not be enough to win the irregular war.
He claimed that he met with Tinubu to change the strategy for dealing with the insecurity that has caused Nigerians to lose sleep as kidnappings and killings have increased.
He stated, “It’s not working, and the reason is…”I had the opportunity to speak with Tinubu about this. In the 1980s, I was pursuing an LLM and a PhD. “I just became interested in counter-intelligence and did a lot of reading at the School of African Oriental Studies,” Agbakoba explained.
“Now, there is regular warfare and irregular, or conventional warfare. Americans lost in Vietnam because they were fighting an irregular conflict.
“To invest billions of dollars in a conventional war strategy in which you are fighting ordinary people like IPOB and Boko Haram is doomed to fail. So I told him, “Change your strategy.” Go to irregular war, and you’ll see the results. “That is the problem.”
The legal luminary went on to explain that changing service chiefs to address the threat of insecurity will not get Nigeria anywhere unless the strategy changes.
He went on to say that the solution to the problem isn’t necessarily about personnel, but about tactics.
“What has happened in the last ten years is that a group of security chiefs were appointed, then fired, and this has continued. So something must be wrong. I said to him, “Do something fresh.” That isn’t happening yet. So, I’ll say that the security policy isn’t working,” he added.
Nigeria is currently dealing with insecurity, as bandits and other criminals have increased kidnappings for ransom, as the recent Ekiti incident demonstrated that Nigerians are at the mercy of assailants.
Early this week, kidnappers ambushed a school bus in Ekiti state, abducting five students, four teachers, and the bus driver.
Two monarchs were ambushed and killed by suspected bandits in the same state, but security forces have stepped in to find the killers.