Civil Rights advocacy Group, the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), has expressed deep shock that the Defence Headquarters could come up with the theory that the terrorists that attacked Plateau and Benue states were foreigners. The rights group then expressed disappointment and consternation that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has not reorganised and restructured the security infrastructures and architecture of the country to safeguard the lives and property of the citizens, “which is the primary constitutional duty for which he was inaugurated to accomplish.”

HURIWA said Friday in a statement by the National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, that “there is no doubt that the statement credited to the Defence Headquarters is scary because it would mean that the Armed Forces of Nigeria have capitulated and admitted spectacular failure to effectively and efficiently execute their constitutional duties, which in very simple terms is to defend the territory of the Federal Republic of Nigeria from foreign invasion by terrorists.”

“All across Nigeria, armed hoodlums and terrorists are holding sway and killing, maiming, destroying lives and property of citizens. From Katsina, Borno, Okigwe and Enugu/Kogi axis of evils, citizens are slaughtered like Christmas goats but the government elected by the people to protect them is unwilling to take the right steps to safeguard the lives and property of citizens which is the fundamental duty of the President and government officials,” HURIWA said.

Speaking during a press briefing in Abuja on Thursday, the Director of Defence Media Operations, Maj. Gen. Markus Kangye, had said that linguistic and physical evidence suggests that many of the attackers are not Nigerian nationals.

“When you hear them speak, you can often tell they are not from here. For example, the Hausa spoken in Nigeria differs from that spoken in Mali, the Central African Republic, or Ghana,” Kangye said.

He further explained that their accent and intonation, as well as their hair texture, clearly identify them as foreigners.

“When we arrest these herders and terrorists, their speech and even their hair distinguish them from Nigerians. Perhaps only the Shuwa Arabs in Borno State have similar features, but not quite the same,” he added.

Reacting, HURIWA said that the implications are far-reaching, “including the unimaginable revelation that the internal physical borders keeping foreign undesirable elements at bay which indeed signify the SOVEREIGNTY of Nigeria, are now so scandalously porous that armed non-state actors can be recruited by some groups or persons within Nigeria to unleash violence and terror on the good people of Nigeria considered as their enemies.”

The rights group asked: “If the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria made up of hundreds of thousands of extensively trained and equipped combatants, can flippantly make such an unforgivable and scandalous admission, it is unjust for the President and the government to still fail to give licences to Nigerians to bear sophisticated weapons such as AK-47 and AK-49 for self defence since both external and internal terrorists wield unimaginable military grade weapons that they deploy to attack the citizens who don’t get effective protection from the regular Armed forces of Nigeria? Why is the politicians who surround themselves with some of the finest combatants in the Armed forces and police, abandon the people of Nigeria to be killed in unimaginable numbers daily?”

HURIWA condemned “the persistent inaction by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to rejig the hierarchy of the Armed Forces of Nigeria for greater efficiency and results”. It asked: “How can the Commander-in-Chief be so comfortable working with service chiefs that have no solution to the security nightmares that citizens face from both terrorists who are within and those infiltrators who invade the territory of Nigeria, attack and retreat”