Being text of a communiqué issued
at the end of a two-day Summit on Security and
Governance in the North East of Nigeria held on Monday 29th and Tuesday 30th
June, 2015 at the Maidugu Guest Palace ,
Gombe, Gombe State
The Summit Summit
The summit had in attendance about
70 participants, drawn from the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF), Office of the
National Security Adviser (ONSA), Nigeria Police Force (NPF), National Boundary
Commission (NBC), National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), National Unity and
Peace Corps (NUPC), Nigeria Bar Association (NBA), Institute for Peace and
Conflict Resolution (ICPR), Victim Support Fund (VSF), Civilian Joint Task
Force (CJTF), National Union of Journalists
(NUJ), the media, civil society groups and universities in the region,
notably University of Maiduguri, Adamawa State University and Taraba State
University. The opening session was chaired by Alhaji Lamido Abubakar (Durbin
Gombe), representing the Emir of Gombe.
After very robust discussions and
deliberations historical and contemporary security and governance challenges in
the North East, including the on-going counter- insurgency initiatives, the participants
observed that:
The security challenges in the
North East are the consequences of failure of governance at different tiers of
government;
Existing conflict early warning
and response mechanisms have been weakened by poor inter-agency coordination
and tensions in civil military relations that generally alienate the populace
from government security institutions;
Although insurgency presents the
most challenging threat to national and human security, the North East region
has also been affected by communal violence, religious violence and violence
conflict over land and water use. The insurgent groups have taken advantage of
existing divisions, rivalries and conflicts among groups to unleash violence on
communities in the region.
The ineffective response to the
insurgency has stemmed from the fact that the Nigeria
The counter insurgency initiative
have suffered from poor equipment and poor intelligence management system of
the Nigerian military as well as the military’s poor understanding of Nigeria’s
geography ;
The default position of deployment
of the military for internal security operations have kept the military
continually engaged in internal law enforcement thereby contributing to the
weakening of the law enforcement capacity of the police;
The porous state of Nigerian
borders has provided a conducive climate for transnational crime such as
unhindered proliferation of smalls arms and light weapons and trafficking in
persons and drug that have made Nigeria’s border areas notably the Lake Chad
Basin insecure but safe havens for insurgent groups and internal criminal
networks;
Mutual suspicions and conflicting
interests among member states of the Lake Chad Basin Commission have affected
the operations of the Multinational Task Force (MNTF);
Recent efforts to
counter-insurgent such as the procurement of more weapons for the armed forces,
addressing of issue of discipline and loyalty, strengthening of cooperative
frameworks among contributing states to the MNTF and relocation of the military
command centre to Maiduguri
The newly inaugurated
administration of President Muhammadu Buhari enjoys enough goodwill both
nationally and globally which is expected to boost the counter-insurgency
effort.
There in need for close security
cooperation at the regional level between affected countries within the Lake
Chad Basin Commission, the ECCAS and ECOWAS;
Politicisation and opaqueness of
the operation of the military makes it difficult to understand their efforts
and provide support from the communities;
There is need for periodic
progress report in order to understand the successes and failures of the various
security agencies in the fight against the insurgency;
The Ministry of Defense should
carry out its constitutional duties to procure weapons for the security
agencies to prevent unilateral procurement by the agencies;
The advancements made in the 6
weeks to the election show that we have the capacity to deal with the
insurgency, if we back it up with political will;
Community policing will assist
greatly in feeding information into the national peace architecture and
fostering community policing would make it difficult for groups like Boko Haram
to grow unnoticed and unchallenged.
Following these observations, the
participants resolved and recommended as follows:
Security
There is need to step up efforts
to resolve all lingering incidents of violent conflict through proactive
implementation of recommendations of panels of enquiries, addressing of
grievances of disaffected groups and effective community policing;
There is need to improve
equipment, morale and discipline in the military in order to sustain the gains in
the counter-insurgency initiatives in the weeks preceding the 2015 elections;
There is need to strengthen coordination
and collaboration among the different security institutions and between
security institutions and the civil society;
The Mobile
section of the Nigeria Police Force should be strengthened through better
training, equipment and deployment to reduce frequency of deployment of the
military for internal security operations;
Government and security
institutions should be adopt measures including training, monitoring and
application of sanctions to ensure adoption and observance of rules of
engagement and respect for human rights and dignity by security personnel
deployed for security operations;
There is need to effectively
implement the national peace and security architecture designed to ensure early
warning and effective response at federal, state, local council and community
levels. The proposed National Peace Commission can be used to coordinate the
functioning of the peace architecture based on existing peace and security
structures;
The commendable effort to
relocate the command centre to Maiduguri should
be enhanced by the appointment of a war commander to lead operations and
collaborate with the MNTF based in Ndjamena ,
Chad
Government and the military
should initiate concrete plans for demobilization and disarmament of the CJTF.
There should involve creation of a database of CJTF members and roll out of plans
for provision of vocational training and job placement of CJTF members and
their possible enlisting into security agencies.
Traditional institutions that
play crucial roles in conflict resolution at the local level should be
strengthened to gain trust of stakeholders and complement the roles of other
agencies and institutions.
Governance
Governance and service delivery
should be improved especially at the state and local government levels in the
North East to address the issues of youth unemployment and restiveness.
There should be strategic
capacity building of community members to demand accountability and
representation from elected leaders;
Credible platforms existing at
the state and community level should be harnessed to support governance and
security measures in the communities.
There is need to strengthen
governance at the local level in order to close the gap between the government
and communities. The prospects of bridging the gap can be enhanced through conduct
of regular elections at the local government levels.
There is need for realignment of
the statutory mandates of National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) and
States Emergency Management Agencies (SEMAs) and the National Commission on
Refugees and Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) to enhance coordination and
effectiveness in the management of the humanitarian emergencies;
The Victim Support Fund (VSF)
should be mobilized to deliver support to victims of the violence including
families of members of the Civilian Joint Task Force (CJTF) that died in
operations, as well as women and orphans and others who suffered irreversible
injuries and loss in the conflict.
Border development and management
agencies should be strengthened by the creation of trans-border institutions
and involvement of community institutions in border areas in security
management.
