By Olusegun Olanrewaju, Lagos, and Ben Ogbemudia, Abuja
The National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Dr Iyorchia Ayu, yesterday accused President Muhammadu Buhari of being comfortable with the state of insecurity in the country, insisting that the president’s statement that “State Police is not an option”, suggests that the situation may not be about to change.

Ayu also criticised the President for pushing the blame on the incessant killing of farmers by terrorists on locals along grazing routes.

These statements were contained in a brief response by Ayu to Buhari’s interview on Channels Television yesterday.

Earlier yesterday, Buhari had during an interview on Channels TV ruled out state policing as a viable resolution for Nigeria’s security challenges.

The country’s ongoing security challenges have further heightened calls for the decentralisation of the Police Force, but Buhari has not been a great fan.

Buhari said there was a greater propensity for governors to abuse their powers with the creation of state police.

He said, “State police is not an option. Find out the relationship between local government and the governors. Are the third tier of government getting what they are supposed to get constitutionally?

“Are they getting it? Let the people in local government tell you the truth, the fight between local governments and the governor.”

Commenting on the security situation in the country, Buhari said traditional rulers must play a huge role in bringing peace to communities.

He also advocated for more dialogue in solving the farmer-herder clashes recorded across the country.

“The role of traditional rulers must not be undermined because in their areas they know who is who, even by families, not to even talk of individuals. So, we have to revert to that system for us to have effective security in the localities.

“For example, there were two governors that came to see me about problems – Oyo State and one other state – because the herders were in their forests but the animals were going into the neighbouring farms and eating the crops. I said, as far as I know, the farmers and herders have been co-existing in Nigeria for generations.

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“Let them go and ask the local leadership what has gone wrong, why the break in communication between the local leadership and the herders,” Buhari added.

However, a statement from Ayu’s media office quoted the PDP National Chairman as declaring that “It appears the continued killings in some localities of Nigeria, particularly in the North, and more specifically in President Buhari’s home state of Katsina, may not matter to him with his statement that state police is not an option.”

Ayu, in the statement he signed, said “Watching President Muhammadu Buhari this evening on Channels TV during an interview session was a gratuitous waste of time because there was nothing new coming from the President.

“As has been said by many before now, to expect anything new from our President would be a misplaced and unfortunate expectation. From the economy to insecurity, the killing of innocent farmers by terrorists (which some erroneously term farmer/herder clashes), and other sundry issues, President Buhari honoured his calling as a President who has nothing new to offer.

“He again repeated the impotent argument regarding the killing of farmers by terrorists, reminding Nigerians of grazing routes. Well, what the President failed to reference is that the herders plying the grazing routes before, neither carried AK47s nor did they engage in raping of women and despoliation of the assets of those along the routes.

“Mr. President’s position of saying the locals should be asked what went wrong flies in the face of reason and contemporary realities. Tied to that, but not limited in scope, is the issue of insecurity and a re-organisation of the Nigeria Police to accommodate present, peculiar, environmental, and social challenges.

“In President Buhari’s view, state police is not an option. Yet, it appears the continued killings in some localities of Nigeria, particularly in the North, and more specifically in his home state of Katsina, may not matter, hence, the need to have a security system that feeds on local intelligence and nuances, which the federal police cannot adequately provide, is not an option to our President.”

In Ayu’s view, “Nigerians should remind President Buhari that people evolve and societies evolve.
Therefore, being trapped in a time capsule of the past about State Police is not an option Nigerians are willing to accept from him.”

S’ West govs consider ‘Amotekun’ option, slam police for disrespecting Sanwo-Olu

Meanwhile, the Chairman of the South-West Governors’ Forum and Governor of Ondo State, Mr Rotimi Akeredolu, yesterday condemned what he called the utter disrespect with which Lagos State governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, was treated during a verbal exchange with a serving Chief Superintendent of Police (CSP), Abimbola Oyewole, on Tuesday.

Oyewole openly defied the order of the Lagos State governor which required he and his men to vacate the Magodo Phase 2 Estate area of the state in the heat of a pending demolition war.

Akeredolu said if anything was to be learnt from the incident, it was that the spat “establishes, beyond doubt, the impracticability of Federalism as a system of government in the country.

He bore his mind in a statement titled: South-West Governors: Police officer’s disrespect to Sanwo-Olu an unacceptable intrusion…Lagos must deploy Amotekun now’.

It read, “We have a video which has gone viral on the social media concerning the disgraceful exchange between a police officer, a CSP, and the Governor of Lagos State, Mr Babajide Sanwo-Olu, the supposed Chief Security Officer of the State, at the Magodo Residential Estate.

“The content of the video is very disconcerting, and this is being charitable. The utter disrespect, which underlines the response of the officer to the governor establishes, beyond doubt, the impracticability of the current system, dubiously christened ‘Federalism’.

“An arrangement, which compels the governor of a state to seek clarifications on security issues in his jurisdiction from totally extraneous bodies or persons, is a sure recipe for anarchy.

“We condemn, very strongly, this brazen assault on decency. We call on the IG to explain the justification for this intrusion. This is not acceptable. Any expectations of rapprochement between so-called federating units and federal security agencies are becoming forlorn, progressively, due to deliberate acts which mock our very avowal to ethics and professionalism.

“We condemn, in very clear terms, the role of the Attorney General of the Federation, Mr Abubakar Malami SAN in this act of gross moral turpitude.”