By Emma Okonji and Nosa Alekhuogie
Security and safety consultant, Femi Dare has said the federal government has not put enough security measures in place to address the growing insecurity in country.
He, therefore, called on government to be more proactive about the state of security in the nation.
Dare who was a guest yesterday on The Morning Show of ARISE NEWS Channel, the broadcast arm of THISDAY Newspapers, noted that there had to be sincerity of purpose by both the federal and state governments to address the issues of insecurity in the country.
“I’ve not seen any intentional drive towards achieving that goal since the civilian rule. Security is not what you buy off the shelf, it has to be systematic and built over a period of time. We have seen how porous our borders have been and the government hasn’t put enough measures in place to secure our borders,” Dare said.
Speaking further, he said: “There has to be a deliberate and purposeful approach towards addressing the state of security otherwise you cannot develop the country. All sorts of people come into our country unaccounted for, we don’t know their history or background and that exposes us to a whole lot of threats. So I think the state government has their direct responsibility likewise the federal government. If restructuring is going to solve the problem, it has to be done as quickly as possible because we can no longer tolerate the idea of having a country with porous borders, lack of security here and there, bombing all over the place is not good for the future of the country.”
According to him, fighting insurgency remained a big business.
“We want to see a situation where technology is deployed in this fight of insecurity in managing our borders. There are quite a lot of technologies that can address these issues. We can also sit on existing infrastructure that we have for the telecommunications to build effective surveillance systems. You have equipments that can be used for intelligence gatherings like the radio barrier system. There has to be an intentional purpose for addressing the vulnerabilities because if you cannot anticipate crime, you cannot stop it. There has to be an intentional drive by the government as the future is looking very ugly at the moment, “Dare said.
He also urged civilians to encourage and motivate the armed forces to keep doing what they are doing as there is a whole lot of risks involved.
He added that if there are people willing to take up this challenge, there should be a way of bringing them in to be a part of the general approach to fight in the war.
Speaking on the re-opening of the borders, he said: “The closure of the border was a very welcoming development at that time because we were able to manage the infiltration of arms coming into the country. There are so many weapons coming into our country. I don’t think the closure is a wise decision to take at this point but due to economic reasons, the government came up with the solution of trying to open up the borders because the strategy of the insurgents is really eating deep into our well being. In my opinion I don’t think the border closure was as effective as it should, if there was a proper way of managing the borders.
