By Yemi Farounbi
In his inaugural speech on 29th May 2023, President Tinubu made many promises to the good people of Nigeria. Some of the promises were carried with immediate effect. These included withdrawal of fuel subsidy and the merger of the official rates and black market foreign exchange rates. The jmplementation of these threw the economy into unimaginable inflation and created inconveniences for Nigerians.
But for the implementation, PBAT has received accolades, which he and his Government have savoured.
There are others that were implemented later. These include the tax reforms, for which accolades are already being poured. We await the realities that the implementation will bring in 2026.
But given our present circumstances of deteriorating security and the ominous cloud associated with the threat of President Trump, President Tinubu must be reminded of his promises on security.
PBAT said “we are here to mend and heal this nation, not to tear and injure it” I was deeply excited by this promise and I believe many Nigerians would love to see the fulfilment of this basic promise.
PBAT promised that Nigeria will be “the indispensable home for each and everyone of us, regardless of creed, ethnicity or place of birth “. It will be great if Nigerians who are being slaughtered daily, kidnapped daily or marooned in IDP camps can have a practicalisation of these promises by a President freely elected by us.
Many Nigerians would love to have a guarantee that Nigeria will always be their indispensable home in the face of these ravaging ISWAP and ISGS that do not even recognise the sovereignty of Nigeria or such other political entities.
More importantly, our dear PBAT promised that “WE SHALL DEFEND OUR NATION FROM TERROR AND ALL FORMS OF CRIMINALITY THAT THREATEN THE PEACE AND STABILITY OF OUR COUNTRY “. Many Nigerians hoped that, with this promise, the Boko Haram and such other terrorists that President Buhari claimed to have decapitated will come to an end.
I personally believed that terrorism and such evil criminality will come to an end because my dear President also promised that “WE shall reform our security DOCTRINE and its ARCHITECTURE “
I applauded because I believed that for once we have a President who has a full understanding of security DOCTRINE and ARCHITECTURE….a President who knows that the NSA doesn’t have to be a retired police or military officer…who remembers that security has multidimensional aspects beyond just carrying guns….who remembers that Henry Kissinger, a professor of government in Harvard University started out in Richard Nixon’s Government as NSA. Nigerians understand that PBAT might have been weighed down by the efforts to decapitate the opposition parties that the very urgent responsibility of introducing a NEW SECURITY DOCTRINE got marginalized into irrelevance.
Many Nigerians looked forward to a rejig of our SECURITY ARCHITECTURE. They believe that Nigeria will achieve her expansive size of almost 1million square km, population of 230m people, its political structure of 36 states and 774 lgas, and complex over 300 ethnic or linguistic units deserve more than ONE police formation under ONE IGP. Many Nigerians believe that the new ARCHITECTURE will give us at least state police formations, and LGA police formations even if we cannot have the over 32000 police formations that USA has. Many Nigerians believe that the promised SECURITY ARCHITECTURE will provide for decentralisation, devolution and indeed localisation of security formations. We expect resistance from existing formations which will desperately protect their empires. But we believe and trust in the courage that PBAT used in withdrawing fuel subsidy will override those empire-protecting resistance.
In the situation in which we are now, doing the same thing over and over, over the years, and expecting different results, it will be great if our dear PBAT will restudy his charter with the Nigerians as contained in his inaugural speech and remain faithful to his dreams and promises….at least in the area of security.
I believe that PBAT will remain faithful to those patriotic dreams and vision.
GOD BLESS NIGERIA.
Ambassador (Dr) Yemi Farounbi OON is an Elder Stateman and Former Nigeria Ambassador to Philippine
