THE countdown to the 2027 elections is gradually approaching. While the official ban on electioneering has been lifted by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), candidates for the epic battle have intensified intense horse trading, throwing up crucial issues that ought to sway prospective voters. Central are the economy, infrastructure, food security, human capital development and the issue of security of lives and property.
The menace of insecurity, which has devastated mostly such states as Niger, Borno, Sokoto, Kebbi, Katsina, Benue, Kogi, Zamfara and Kebbi , has taken different facets, including insurgency, banditry, kidnapping, abduction and banditry. Minister of Defence, General Christopher Musa underlined the deep concern of the authorities on the blistering state of security in the land. Ditto the National Security Adviser (NSA), Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, who cited illiteracy among other vulnerabilities that act as catalysts for insecurity, particularly across the North. He said the condition makes it for criminally minded few to lure and recruit mostly the youths in the region hitherto known for peace and stability. Coupled with this is what he considers as the influx of small arms, corruption, and injustice. ‘This is why groups like Boko Haram and other extremist organisations exploit to take advantage to exploit vulnerabilities by offering alternative narratives that promise belonging, purpose, and at times financial benefits for coercion,’ he stated. Part of his recommendation, to tame the menace, he said is for all the authorities to collaborate and ‘come up with a realistic template of bridging the gap in school enrollment.’
General Christopher Musa, gave a deeper insight into why the battle against extreme criminality remains nagging and protracted. One of his submissions on the activities of insurgents, banditry and others bothers on conspiracy. ‘There are several stories of how people have aided them in giving them food, giving them water, and giving them information, and these are the things that keep them going, and we call this the oxygen.’
Yet, another main stakeholder in the North and spokesman for the seventh House of Representatives, Honourable Zakari Muhammed, equally dissected the menace of insecurity in the North. The criminologist listed lack of education, radicalisation of religion by people for economic gains as part of the cause of insecurity. ‘The third reason for escalating insecurity is the lack of political will because to him, banditry, Boko Haram insurgency, and kidnapping have been franchised in such a way that some elements – including some people in government – do not want the insecurity to end because of the enormous resources involved.’ Therefore, he advocates stronger deployment of technology in the fight against terrorism. If you can send a drone to their locations, you can also use the same drone to neutralise them.
North-West security summit
In Zamfara, both kinetic and non-kinetic approaches have been adopted to fight bandits. There was a time the authorities had no flight zones in the bid to crush the criminals. To up the ante, the state government convened a summit as part of the ongoing efforts to flush out bandits and other criminal elements wreaking havoc on communities. Governor Dauda Lawal admitted the problem as he said: ‘This is a test from Almighty Allah, and we will certainly overcome it through prayer and sustained investment in military hardware to defeat the terrorists.’ The activities of bandits have not only manifested in the spectre of violence in many communities, disruption of agricultural production, displacement of families, sacking of children of school and destruction of livelihoods, putting credibility of the government to protect lives and property at stake.
The North-West security summit, held recently thus provided an opportunity for the governor to expose the underbelly of bandits that had maimed and killed over the years. The theme of the summit was ‘Appraising the Security Challenges in the Northwest Zone’. Governor Lawal did not mince words on the resolve of his administration to stamp out banditry in his domain. He asserted that there will be no retreat and no surrender in the war on the bandits. His resolve is that the country was poised to neutralise those few elements that are bent on making life miserable for the citizens and mortgaging the future of Nigeria.
For Governor Lawal, negotiating with the terrorists would mean not only surrendering the authority of the state to them, but would also encourage other criminal groups to embrace the same violent path. In good conscience, negotiating with such criminal groups from their position of perceived advantage-after they have taken innocent people hostage and intimidated them with their capacity to unleash terror-is unacceptable to Governor Lawal. His position is tough opposition to any form of negotiation with the terrorists. It is about refusing to accept a security strategy that allows the criminal groups to exploit state boundaries, weak intelligence coordination, and gaps in military operations to continue to wreak havoc on the people. It underlines his ‘No Retreat, No Surrender’ proclamation. It also underscores the choice of Zamfara as the venue for the summit. By hosting security chiefs, Governor Lawal was able to once again place the realities confronting his people directly before them. Thus, he used the opportunity to insist that the North-West security crisis demands coordinated action and a strategy capable of producing results. Governor Lawal canvassed for immediate workable strategies, coordinated action among the North-west states and for the security establishment to confront the wider criminal ecosystem that makes the attacks possible. He acknowledged that banditry, kidnapping and cattle rustling are not isolated criminal acts confined to the North-West states, but manifestations of organised criminal groups that cut across boundaries, with devastating consequences for livelihoods, food security and the social fabric of the society. Criminal networks do not respect state boundaries; therefore, the security response cannot remain trapped within specific states. To defeat them, security operations must be coordinated across the states, including Niger State in the North-Central, with intelligence shared and actions synchronised across these state lines. This is where Governor Lawal’s argument about simultaneous military actions assumes significance beyond Zamfara State. A terrorist group operating in Zamfara State can easily move into Sokoto, Katsina or Kebbi States, establish new bases, recruit fresh members and cultivate local informants-an often-neglected factor in the security crisis. When military operations intensify in one state, these groups exploit gaps in coordination to move into another, making intelligence-sharing and synchronised operations across state lines essential to tracking their movements, disrupting their networks and preventing them from launching further attacks.
For Governor Lawal, the logical way forward is therefore a coordinated North-west security architecture in which the seven states work closely with the Federal Government and the security agencies, sharing intelligence in real time, coordinating operations and ensuring that criminal groups can no longer exploit state boundaries to escape. Such a unified approach, he believes, would be a game changer in the fight against terrorism by denying the criminals the safe havens and escape routes they have long exploited. He said there must be no safe havens, no escape routes and no gaps for them to exploit, which will make coordinated regional operations a far more effective weapon in the fight against terrorism and banditry. Besides, he said the war requires dismantling the ecosystem that sustains them – the money, intelligence, logistics, weapons, food, transportation and local collaborators that enable these groups to operate. He said the state must pursue not only those waging violence against the people, but also the networks that finance, supply, shelter and facilitate them. This means strengthening financial intelligence, stopping the payment of ransom and other illicit revenue flows, dismantling supply chains, monitoring vulnerable corridors, improving grassroots intelligence and ensuring that those who knowingly facilitate criminal activities are identified and prosecuted.
The role of local collaborators, he said, is particularly important. This is because criminal groups have, over the years, incubated and survived not only through their capacity for violence, but also through a network of local collaborators who are critical to their operations. But it must be stressed that the overwhelming majority of people living in Zamfara’s affected communities are victims of terrorism. They have lost relatives, homes, farms, businesses and years of their lives to unprecedented violence and should never be collectively portrayed as collaborators.
Without dismantling these internal support networks, military operations risk addressing only the visible symptoms of the crisis while leaving the underlying structure intact. This is also why intelligence sharing must be part of the regional security strategy. The people living in the villages know their environment better than any security operative that is new to the area. They observe unusual movements and recognise strangers. Properly organised and responsibly integrated into the formal security architecture, intelligence gathered in the communities can provide the early warning that allows conventional forces to act before an attack occurs.
It is worth noting that the Inspector-General of Police, Tajudeen Disu, agrees with Governor Lawal on the need for a united regional front and that the security of the North-west is a collective responsibility. And that his emphasis on cross-state collaboration, intelligence-sharing and joint operations reinforces the central argument of the summit that no individual state can defeat a criminal network whose operational theatre extends across several states.
Bugged down by avoidable calamities and deprivation occasioned by banditry, residents of Zamfara have had to look up to the state government for succor and renewed hope, especially in the last three years. So, Governor Lawal, has initiated measures to restore public confidence in the system. Since June 2023, he has held repeated meetings with security chiefs, police commissioners and military commanders, followed by engagements with the NSA, the Chief of Defence Staff, the Chief of Army Staff and President Bola Tinubu. At each meeting, the message has remained consistent: Zamfara State needs a more coordinated response, more effective intelligence and a military strategy that looks at the entire North West.
On the institutional front, his administration established the Zamfara State Security Trust Fund, inaugurated its 21-member Board of Trustees in February 2024 and commissioned its integrated office complex the following month. The initiative was designed to create a structure for mobilising and directing resources towards the security challenge. He also launched the Zamfara State Community Protection Guards in January 2024, providing a locally rooted mechanism intended to complement conventional security operations and strengthen intelligence-gathering at the grassroots. The decision to restrict traditional rulers from issuing mining licences was also aimed at curbing illegal mining activities that have been associated with the financing of armed groups. Technology has also entered the equation, with the state hosting a course on Artificial Intelligence as a potential security instrument. Governor Lawal in his interaction with the UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed announced his administration’s intention to deploy advanced technology in the fight against insecurity
Conclusion
No doubt, the protracted battle against banditry and other forms of extremism has left many communities in the North-West almost prostrate. The raging insecurity scares potential investors and imperils agriculture, the economic mainstay of the zone. Many companies and businesses have stopped operations because of insurgency. Banditry has created an atmosphere of fear, with farmers fleeing from ancestral homes. According to some experts, the disruption has resulted in a drastic decline in food production. Therefore, the summit could not have come at a better time in the North-West.