‘Terrorists Exploiting Structural, Institutional Weaknesses’

A security consultant, Dr Kabir Adamu, has said terrorists are exploiting Nigeria’s structural and institutional vulnerabilities to perpetrate violence across the country.

Adamu, the managing director, Beacon Security and Intelligence Ltd, in a interview with LEADERSHIP, said terrorists were collecting ransom via the banking system because the regulatory institutions had failed to enforce their powers.

He said such “developments were indicative of the existing structural and institutional vulnerabilities in Nigeria that are continuously being exploited by diverse threat elements to perpetrate violence and other forms of criminality”.

According to Adamu, this is in spite of the fact that Nigeria’s National security enterprise has about 43 ministries, departments and agencies, instruments in addition to National Security Strategy, National Counter Terrorism Strategy and National Defence Policy etc and partnerships both bilateral and multilateral.

“What is clear is that the government is allowing politics to interfere with security sector governance and has failed to galvanise national powers to address these institutional and structural vulnerabilities.

“Most of what the governments (federal and states) do at the moment are knee jerk approaches without addressing the core socio economic, political and environmental issues that are the root causes and triggers of insecurity in Nigeria

“If you pick ransom collection through POS we have the Federal Ministry of Communication, Innovation and Digital Economy, CBN and the NFIU that ordinarily can use their regulatory powers to identify and arrest as well as prosecute suspects but we see very little of that and the National Assembly that should use legislative instruments to pressure these organisations is failing to do so,” he said.

Recall that the Office of the National Security Adviser recently revealed that terrorists were receiving ransoms through point of sale (POS), this is despite various checks customers go through to verify their accounts as mandated by the Central Bank of Nigeria.

He added that corruption and personal interests were behind their actions and preferences, driven by political expedience in the fight against insecurity.