Changing security chiefs won't save us, we need to fix the whole system

Charles Omole, a security consultant, said something at the Platform Nigeria event that hit me hard. He said changing security leadership is like changing drivers while traveling in the wrong direction. Na wa o. We have changed IGP how many times now? Yet bandits are still running wild in Katsina and kidnappers are having field day on the Abuja-Kaduna highway.

Ayo Obe, the lawyer and columnist, also dropped truth. She said human rights and security are not enemies but partners. But our government treats them like they are fighting each other. When security forces can just disappear people and nobody answers, that is not security. That is fear. Bukola Saraki also reminded us that the National Assembly was created to check executive power. But look at our senators now, most of them just clap for the president.

We keep thinking the next CDS or the next IGP will solve everything. But Omole is right, security is the job of the whole government. Education policy, land management, urban planning, even how we handle justice. If a young man in Kano cannot find a job and there is no school for his children, he becomes easy recruitment for bandits. So tell me, why are we still pretending this is just a military problem?