Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, on Thursday said the three arms of the Nigerian government must take all necessary actions to tackle the security challenges facing the country.
Gbajabiamila noted that the spate of insecurity had continued to disrupt and threaten the lives of the people as well as the continued existence of the country.
The Speaker stated this in Abuja while declaring open a two-day workshop on promoting effective legislation and oversight of the security sector in Nigeria organised by the House Committee on National Security and Intelligence in collaboration with the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung Foundation
A statement by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Lanre Lasisi, titled ‘All Arms of Government Must Work to Address Security Challenges, Gbajabiamila Says’, quoted him to have warned against the dire consequences of allowing the security crises to persist.
He said, “We are at this moment experiencing in many parts of our country, significant internal security challenges that have disrupted the lives of many of our citizens and led to a loss of lives and property at a scale that cannot easily be quantified.
“These internal security challenges threaten the very existence of the Nigerian state because they undermine public faith in the government’s ability to fulfil its fundamental obligation to protect the lives and property of citizens.
“Across the three arms of government, we have a shared responsibility to take all necessary actions to meet these challenges head-on. This is what the people who elected us rightly expect.”
According to Gbajabiamila, national security is generally understood to be the preserve of the executive arm of government. He said as a result, the general public and the political class often do not know what the legislative role in national security is or ought to be.
The Speaker said, “This knowledge gap presents an ongoing limitation on the policy-making and oversight role of the legislature as it pertains specifically to the challenges we face in the national security sector. Workshops such as the one we have gathered here for today are an essential tool in reversing this gap.”
He added, “The realities of the moment require that we be willing to speak honest truths about the things we haven’t gotten right so that we can then focus our energies on making sure that we do better for the future.
“I encourage all of you to remember that a lot of the hopes we have for our country depend on our ability to guarantee the safety of our people and the security of property and investments. And from this remembrance, I hope we can find the motivation to do all that this moment requires of us.
“Key followers of the House would notice that security has been a very important part of our work. It’s part of our legislative agenda. When I came in, I visited three key states affected by insecurity. I went to Katsina, Borno and Zamfara.”
