Adaba FM: Donald Trump’s threat to invade Nigeria has generated concerns across the country and beyond. From your experience, how should Nigeria interpret such a statement?
Adeogun: I think Nigerians should understand that this is a genuine threat. It is not rhetoric when you look at President Trump and the actions he has taken since he assumed office for his second term. You also have to understand that this is global politics, not just about insecurity in Nigeria or particularly the persecution of Christians in our country. It has to do with the economic interest of the United States of America.
Adaba FM: Nigeria has rejected the claim by Donald Trump and China has thrown its weight behind us. What do you make of this international response?
Adeogun: Well, the reality is that Nigeria is being bullied because Nigeria took a position to join the BRICS Nations. You are aware of the BRICS Nations that started with Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa joined lately. President Trump had at his assumption of office for the second term threatened to deal with any nation that aligns with China, and unfortunately when the U.S was having the America-Africa Summit, Nigeria chose to attend the BRICS Summit instead of going to the United States. You’ll recall too that it was in the course of that that President Trump invited some Presidents of African nations like Liberia, Gabon and others, and he expressed surprise at how the President of Liberia could speak English. So, he’s used to bullying and he does not like the fact that Nigeria is taking a position to protect her own interest.
Adaba FM: According to CNN, what triggered this was that President Trump was watching a programme on Fox Channel where this issue was being analysed and some statistics read out. Donald Trump picked interest and called the U.S War Secretary to prepare for action in Nigeria. Rather than coming for military action in Nigeria, don’t you think the U.S should be providing support in areas of intelligence and the needed technology?
Adeogun: The first thing we all have to bear in mind is that President Trump is not a diplomat. He doesn’t seem to understand international diplomacy and is not ready to respect the United Nations Charter which protects the sovereignty of every nation. Serious presidents don’t act based on what they see on TV. What presidents do is to investigate. Part of the reasons the U.S has a mission in Nigeria is to be able to have the facts about issues in and around the country and we saw the U.S ambassador debunk the acclaimed persecution of Christians in our country when the issue was first raised. I think in this case, President Trump rather than call the Secretary of State to get in touch with the U.S Ambassador in Nigeria, just acted on the spur of the moment as he often does. In reality, this is not the first time that the U.S is acting like this, they have actually done the same to several other countries. In a normal case, a President will reach out to the President of another country perceived to be in distress and offer to help where possible. That’s how to collaborate in international relations. You may advance intelligence, offer training and weapons. If your neighbour has a problem, you don’t go around and start threatening to attack your neighbour for having a problem. You rather offer to help where you can, but unfortunately President Trump is not a diplomat.
Adaba FM: In this whole thing, there are killings in Nigeria virtually every week and the government is saying they’re working. Of course, the statistics of Christians killed under the last administration seem to be coming down but rather than downplaying the alarm raised by the U.S, what should the Federal Government of Nigeria do to make the country safe?
Adeogun: We must understand that it’s a fundamental responsibility of the government to protect Nigerians irrespective of tribe, religion or creed. Are we facing security challenges? The answer is yes. Has enough been done to nip the situation in the bud? I think what is being done has fallen short of what is required, hence, people don’t feel safe especially in certain parts of the country. But I do not want Nigerians to have any doubt that what happened is purely international politics. I am a Christian and I am not being persecuted. Granted that we have attacks in Benue and Plateau States, but these are traditional attacks. They’ve probably been happening before religion came into play. It’s basically conflicts over land and boundaries sparked by attempts by Fulani herdsmen to take over some areas. So, it’s economic conflict, definitely not religious, and we have to tone down that narrative. Now, what should the FG do? The security forces have to ensure that every part of Nigeria is safe for everyone to live in peace.
Adaba FM: Some are of the view that the U.S doesn’t feel comfortable with some of the reforms being implemented by President Tinubu, and some people have said a U.S lawmaker proposed the establishment of a U.S military base in Port Harcourt which is the oil nerve of Nigeria. Meanwhile, these killings are happening in the north. So people think such should not even come to Port Harcourt where there are no semblances of issues of persecution of Christians. Help us make sense of this please.
Adeogun: I think people should ignore that as beer parlour talks. First, the U.S cannot establish a military base on our soil without the permission of the Government of Nigeria. So it’s not even an issue. There has been no single place in the world where the U.S just walked in and established a military base. They must have local consent. That issue therefore should be discountenanced totally. If there’s any place there are serious security challenges to warrant such, it’s the Sahel region. And the reality is that the insecurity in the Sahel stemmed from the American invasion of Libya and Iraq from where the militias bred by the situation trickled into Nigeria. So, it’s absurd to think America will consider establishing a military base in Rivers State, Nigeria. I don’t think that is on the table.
Adaba FM: I listened to the Foreign Affairs Minister yesterday where he downplayed these issues. How can Nigeria leverage on its global alliances to protect its image, ensure stability and project strength in international relations?
Adeogun: I think we still need to re-establish our relationship with the U.S but unfortunately America’s foreign relations at the moment are dictated by relationships with the President rather than what the Secretary of State understands to be plausible. If you understand what happened between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy, President of Ukraine, if you understand his threat to level Palestine and convert it to a place for wealthy Americans and Jews, then you’ll see that this is a game. He expects us to send emissaries to him and offer him mineral resources. That’s what he did in Ukraine. He asked that America should have access to the country’s resources in exchange for their protection. What’s happening now could be the same game. It’s a strategy. So what we have to do is to look for avenues to reach out but not by offering bribe. And we have to also take seriously the appointment of ambassadors in Nigeria’s missions abroad because Nigeria has not had ambassadors for about two years now. I think we should do something about that, and they must be the right calibre of persons we are putting to the jobs.
Adaba FM: We have seen a lot of Nigerians actually supporting the threat of invasion by Donald Trump. Should this kind of thing be celebrated by Nigerians?
Adeogun: I do not think reasonable Nigerians are celebrating. If the skies fall, it’ll land on everybody’s head. America has a history of destabilization. So this is beyond politics and sentiments. Libya after the U.S invasion is left worse and directionless; you have instances of Syria where the ISIS are waxing stronger, Afghanistan where the Talibans are now ruling after U.S intervention, the Al-Qaeda still active in Iraq and Vietnam too is in the examples. They tried to play a game in Somalia and till today the country hasn’t been the same again. Most places where America put their boots on the ground are in crises. So we must understand that they’re not coming to Nigeria for a Christmas party. They’re coming to destabilize our country and seek regime change. They may drive our country backwards a hundred years and land us in the pocket of America. I’m aware there has been propaganda from separatist agitators like IPOB. Some of the data and information you heard the American lawmakers reeling out are propaganda publicized by IPOB. It’s basically because they’re pursuing a separatist agenda. Nigerians therefore should not celebrate. We should actually rally round our country irrespective of all divides and discourage any bully from bullying us. If it happens, we are all going to suffer.
Adaba FM: From your expertise, what are the main reasons you think we are still battling kidnapping, terrorism, banditry and other violent crimes?
Adeogun: First, you need to understand that there’s a difference between war and asymmetric war. In a warfare, you know your attackers and you can see them. In asymmetric warfare, you are fighting a disappearing object. Attackers appear in this place, strike your people and mix with others. Then they appear in another place to launch an attack because they’re immersed with the populace. So when you want to attack where they’re supposedly staying, you are likely to kill the same innocent people you seek to protect. We’ve seen instances of such attacks in Niger State. Importantly, why are we facing this? Like I mentioned before, the destabilization of Libya had major impact on the security of the Sahel region. We have issues in Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Chad because a lot of loose weapons came from Russia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, Syria and Libya, and the allies of ISIS like Boko Haram and ISWAP got training and weapons from their associates, then they started going around more boldly to perpetrate these crises. We must not forget too that domestically we have a problem of illegal mining. Because there’s illegal mining of gold in Zamfara State, you have Chinese coming around to mine and engaging these attackers to protect themselves. I understand we have a similar issue too in Kogi State which is why Ondo State sometimes feels threatened. Kogi State harbours the southern base of ISWAP, so when they get attacked in Kogi, these guys move to Ondo and Ekiti States. Hence, there’s a good side to the American threat — most of them are going to run elsewhere. The negative side is that investors that are going to come to Nigeria may begin to have a second thought now. Nigerians are going to panic and the gains we are getting from the economic recovery may also suffer some downturns. Importantly therefore, we must eliminate this fear.
Adaba FM: The government has deployed several new initiatives and called for state police. Do you think these are enough to efficiently deal with the situation?
Adeogun: Well, the efforts are not enough. The Council of State has inaugurated a committee to see to the upgrading of training institutions for our security forces, and that’s like the bottom line. Our security personnel haven’t been getting proper training. In most countries, security agents are trained for every single operation they are involved in. But here a policeman trained in Oyin Akoko may not have another training again till the end of his career. Meanwhile, threats change every day which means security officers’ training too should be improving. So we need to invest more in training and weaponry. We have to see to improvement in intelligence gathering and response time so that our security personnel can be up to speed and be able to pre-empt threats rather than being reactive. Those are the major things we still need to do to make our country safer.
Adaba FM: The security architecture of the country was recently rejigged by President Tinubu. How do you assess the security performance under this administration vis-à-vis reforms in training and deployment of technology?
Adeogun: I think there’s been substantial improvement in dealing with insecurity and I will give you two instances. First, I visited someone in Maitama last week and the gentleman was explaining to me that for eight years he couldn’t drive from Abuja to Kaduna but he does that now almost every week. When I asked what happened, he said if you drive through the road these days there is more presence of security personnel and the road has been expanded such that you can see many things from afar as against when criminals were using forested areas to perpetrate their evil. The road is still being repaired but a lot better now. I got a similar story from someone who travels through Kabba in Kogi to Akoko in Ondo too. In fact, drones are used for surveillance on that route. The truth is, we can never see a hundred percent in security. People still get killed in the U.S every day but our own is that we need to ensure there’s no impunity such that any man who commits a crime doesn’t go scot-free. We should never allow a crime to go unpunished.
Adaba FM: Look at the peculiarities of the issues on the Plateau, in Benue and Southern Kaduna which are majorly populated by Christians, what do you think the Tinubu administration should be doing differently because the old methods seem not to be enough to nip the issues in the bud?
Adeogun: First is to understand the real causes of these conflicts. Anyone who has followed the trajectory of the issues on the Plateau will understand that it is a matter between the Birom people and the Fulani people. The Biroms own the land while the Fulanis occupy the land, and then at some point they feel entitled to the lands because they’ve stayed in those places for long. We have a similar situation in Benue and actually Taraba State too. They’re all territorial conflicts. But because most of the farmers in these areas are Christians and most of the invaders are Muslims, people tend to believe that the Fulanis are basically fighting a religious war. That’s not true. The Fulanis kill everybody on their way. For you to clearly understand this is to look at what’s happening in Katsina and Zamfara States — all the bandits in those areas are attacking Muslims because they are Muslim dominated areas. The issue is therefore economic. What do I now think the government should do? It is basically to find a way to mop up illicit weapons and stop their supply. If attackers don’t have weapons, they’ll not be motivated to fight, but as long as they have access to weapons coming from the Sahel and North Africa, the issues are far from over. We must therefore man our borders very tightly to prevent Fulanis from Niger from coming through our porous borders with weapons. Even someone was caught in Onitsha transporting about a thousand rifles from the south to the north to supply to these attackers. Hence, we must do everything possible to disallow non-state actors from having access to weapons and ammunition across the country.
Adaba FM: If you are to take a look at the number of weapons in the hands of non-state actors, it is still high in spite of the efforts by security agencies. What do you think this administration has done differently and what more can it do in this regard?
Adeogun: You are aware the FG created a Centre for the Control and Proliferation of Small Arms and Light Weapons. The law was passed by the ninth National Assembly and it took off effectively with President Tinubu. I don’t think enough has been done by the agency to sensitize members of the public. You mentioned surrendering of weapons earlier, and I’ll like to share my experience with you. I once had to deal with issues of weaponry in the Niger Delta and I had an encounter with a young man. When we were trying to persuade him to surrender his weapons, he asked me how would I feel when someone asked me to surrender my pen that I’m using to work without offering me an alternative? He said the weapon he was holding was his source of livelihood. So if I’m asking him to surrender his weapons, I must provide an alternative. And I think that’s one of the things the FG needs to do. Apart from those who are ideologically sick, most other people are involved in crimes for economic reasons. So, the government needs to provide jobs and means of economic sustenance for people who we want to turn away from committing crimes.
Adaba FM: Some people have alluded to the fact that the gains of the economic reforms of President Tinubu are beginning to make western powers uncomfortable. Do you subscribe to that school of thought or you think there’s something concrete that could be made from it?
Adeogun: The assumption that you have a monolithic western power is wrong. That doesn’t exist any longer. You now have individual countries — U.S, Germany, France, Canada, U.K. Today U.S is fighting Canada, fighting China and fighting others because she feels like she doesn’t need anybody. It’s like we’ve gone from globalization to unilateralism. I will say yes to the question that there are people whose businesses are being threatened because you have American, Indian, Malta refineries who no longer get patronage since we now have our own refinery and the President is imposing tariffs on imported fuel in order to encourage more of local production. In fact, we now export fuel to them rather than shipping our crude abroad. Some of these people have used their lobbying powers to try to undermine Dangote Refinery on many occasions. Some tank farm owners in Nigeria too tried to instigate people against Dangote Refinery because they’re losing businesses. What President Tinubu has done is to protect Dangote Refinery so that we can encourage other investors. Today, BUA is building a refinery and a host of other refineries are coming up and as long as government is doing everything to protect them, some people will get angry. I need to add this, I am a car owner and I have bought both Dangote fuel and other fuels. The reality is that Dangote fuel burns slower — indicating that it is also cleaner for engines and more economical to purchase Made in Nigeria fuel.
Adaba FM: In terms of internal security, what policy or strategy would you recommend to ensure the benefits of economic growth translate to peace and tranquility in city centres and hinterlands?
Adeogun: We need to find a way to allow Nigerians bear light weapons with which they can defend themselves. If we live in a world where criminals have access to weapons and people cannot carry any, it is not a level playground. So people must be able to possess licensed weapons and get trained to use them for self-defence. We also need to sensitize every citizen to be involved in security — to share information with security agencies, to get basic security training and to be aware of what to do in certain situations. When the National Youth Service Corps was started, it was part of the idea but it has been jettisoned. We need to have a reserve base in our citizens — giving them paramilitary training to be capable enough to bear challenges and confront situations, but they’ll not bear arms because they’re engaged in other jobs. FG is also considering the establishment of Forest Guards who we used to call Ṣọgbo-Ṣọgbo in the traditional Yoruba society and that’s a good one. Once we are able to secure our forests, a lot of these bandits will no longer be comfortable to do their heinous businesses.
Adaba FM: With both foreign pressure and international challenges, what message of reassurance
