The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has expressed profound disappointment with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s 2026 Democracy Day address, describing significant portions of the speech as repetitive, disconnected from the harsh realities facing Nigerians, and fundamentally defective in its approach to the nation’s worsening security crisis.

While acknowledging the President’s recognition of June 12 heroes and democratic values, HURIWA believes the speech failed to address the most urgent concerns confronting ordinary Nigerians, including terrorism, insecurity, the rising cost of living, mass unemployment, and the growing threat to education across several parts of the country.

Most troubling is the President’s continued insistence on keeping “the door of surrender open” for terrorists who have murdered thousands of innocent Nigerians, destroyed communities, abducted schoolchildren, and displaced millions of citizens.

HURIWA considers this position fundamentally flawed.

What exactly happens after terrorists surrender? Are Nigerians expected to continue witnessing a policy under which individuals responsible for mass killings are rehabilitated, reintegrated, and returned to society while victims and their families continue to suffer without justice?

The association firmly rejects any policy that appears to reward terrorism with rehabilitation while communities devastated by violence remain neglected.

Instead of repeatedly extending surrender offers, the Federal Government should deploy the full might of the Nigerian Armed Forces, supported by the best available intelligence-gathering capabilities, to identify terrorist enclaves and dismantle them completely through carefully coordinated military operations.

The primary responsibility of government is to protect law-abiding citizens, not to negotiate endlessly with those who have declared war against the Nigerian state.

Equally disturbing is the President’s failure to address the issue of sabotage within the nation’s security architecture.

For years, allegations have persisted that some insiders within the military and security establishments leak operational plans to terrorists and criminal networks, thereby undermining military operations and exposing personnel to danger.

HURIWA expected the President, as Commander-in-Chief, to announce concrete measures aimed at identifying, investigating, and rooting out such saboteurs. His silence on this critical issue represents a major omission.

The association is also alarmed by the President’s failure to present a comprehensive plan for securing Nigerian schools.

At a time when school abductions continue to traumatize families and force thousands of children out of classrooms, the absence of any detailed commitment to school safety is unacceptable.

Education is a fundamental human right. Yet many parents across Northern Nigeria remain fearful of sending their children to school because of persistent threats from terrorists, bandits, and kidnappers.

A Democracy Day speech that fails to address the protection of children and educational institutions cannot be considered complete.

Furthermore, HURIWA notes that the speech devoted extensive attention to government achievements and the distribution of national honours while offering insufficient acknowledgment of the suffocating cost-of-living crisis currently confronting Nigerians.

Millions of families are struggling to afford food, transportation, healthcare, housing, and education.

Inflation continues to erode purchasing power, while unemployment and underemployment remain at disturbing levels, particularly among young people.

Poverty, hunger, unemployment, and economic hopelessness are themselves grave threats to democracy.

A democracy in which citizens cannot afford basic necessities is a democracy under severe strain.

The association also observes that large portions of the speech closely mirror themes repeatedly presented in previous national addresses, offering little in terms of fresh policy direction or innovative solutions to the nation’s pressing challenges.

While national honours have their place in preserving history and recognizing sacrifice, governance cannot be reduced to the annual distribution of awards.

What Nigerians urgently require are measurable improvements in security, economic wellbeing, access to education, job creation, and public confidence in state institutions.

HURIWA therefore calls on President Tinubu to move beyond ceremonial declarations and provide Nigerians with a concrete, results-driven roadmap for defeating terrorism, securing schools, addressing economic hardship, tackling unemployment, and strengthening democratic institutions.

The sacrifices of the heroes of June 12 can only be truly honoured when democracy delivers security, justice, prosperity, and hope to ordinary Nigerians.