The Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, has lent his support to the establishment of regional security outfits even as he acknowledged that the current national security architecture had failed.
Lawan who spoke with journalists on Monday therefore called for an urgent review of the country’s security architecture to accommodate intervention from other tiers of government.
Describing the current security challenges in the country as unfortunate, Lawan promised that the Senate would summon the heads of the various security agencies in the country as soon as plenary resumes to work out a realistic arrangement that could adequately deal with the problem.
According to him, the present security system has failed to achieve the needed results of securing lives and properties of Nigerian.
Lawan described the regional intervention by some governors as a good idea saying, “All hands must be on deck. The Federal, states and local governments. More importantly, citizens must be involved. This is because wherever you see security improving that means the citizens are playing their roles very well.”
He spoke further: “The onus lies largely on government. So, we are going to work with the executive arm of government in this regard.
“We would engage the security agencies to find out why the security is deteriorating in many parts of the country.
“We have had series of engagement before but the escalation now has made it mandatory that we need a definite position as a government because we just cannot play politics with security issues.
“Lives are at stake here. Therefore the Senate will take a position on how security in the country should be. We believe that the security architecture should be restructured. The present system does not give us the type of outcome that we need.
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“Whether it is the federal, state or local government; Even the traditional rulers or others, the most important thing is to secure the lives and property of Nigerians and we would do that.
“The most important thing is to look into the issue of security that is bedeviling this country.
“Apparently and obviously, all hands must be on deck to ensure that we bring back a better security situation that we had before.
Presently the story is not good. In many areas we have so much happening that is destabilising our communities and killing of people.
“We believe that we owe Nigerians, the responsibility to intervene and work together with the executive arm of government, actually to work together with other tiers of government – the states and even the local governments.
“We should ensure that we change the way we approach the security issues in this country. Apparently the system has not been working efficiently and effectively and we have to do something.
“This time around there should not be buck passing, we have to be forthright. We have to say it as it is and we have to do it as it is required”
