By Steve Osuji
There's obviously trouble in Aso Rock. President Bola Tinubu seems to be in a panic mode right now as the race to the 2027 general elections gets trickier.
Everything seems to be coming apart on the president's 3rd anniversary 29th of May, but the security situation is particularly at its nadir. Waves of murderous attacks continue in the North Central. The Presidency doesn't even do condolences anymore. Emergency Security council meetings have become monotonous as little results are yielded from such gatherings.
AN EXASPERATED PRESIDENT: Worried and troubled, the President had to take a bit more drastic actions, it seems. Something had to give. Last Monday Tinubu appointed retired Gen. Adeyinka Famadewa as a Special Adviser, Homeland Security (SAHS). This office is new to this land. Homeland Security office was a child born out of an emergency. It was created on the back of the al Qaida bombings in the US on September 11, 2001.
Mallam Nuhu Ribadu, the National Security Adviser (NSA) hasn't actually lived up to the billings of the huge office from the outset.
First, he has proved to be more of a politician than a security tactician.
Second, he comes from a narrow background of policing and anti-graft experience. He obviously can't be adept at warfare, counter-terrorism and military strategies in the manner of a good retired military general.
Third, a nonmilitary personnel cannot effectively marshal and direct generals in a war situation. If perchance, he understands the intricacies of war, can he win the allegiances and loyalties of war commanders? A former police officers?
This may explain why much the same problems have persisted in the near two -decade-old war against terror in Nigeria. Inter-agencies cooperation has been persistently lacking. Intelligence has been nigh nonexistent and corruption has been rife at both high and low cadres of the military super structure.
Generals have serially been indicted for carting away entire defence budgets while the rank and file in the fields are known to easily merchandise their arms - sometimes out of greed, sometimes to feed as men in the front lines are often left in the lurch.
Yet another hiccup: NSA Ribadu who has been the backbone of this administration from the onset is known to be more worried about his 2031 presidential ambition than getting the job at hand done. It's said that he's more concerned about building his political war chest than building arsenal for fighting the now intractable terror that threatens to overwhelm Tinubu's government.
Recall also the incidence of a coup which the military command first denied vehemently. Yet men and officers have been apprehended, clamped into indefinite detention as their trial drags.
And then, the small matter of Ribadu being mentioned by terrorists caught in Kwara whose arms were traced to the Office of the NSA.
All of these must have culminated in the president losing confidence in the NSA.
Firing Ribadu would be disingenuous at this moment of deep angst in the north. Finding a suitable replacement from the north will even be more difficult.
What's to be done? Simple. Effectively sideline Ribadu. Let him sit as a lameduck in the ONSA!
ENTERS GEN. FAMADEWA: EXPRESSO avers that everything is wrong with this appointment. First: The retired General had his name mangled both by the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (OSGF) and the military headquarters. In several news releases, the surname was spelt: FADEWA.
Haba, What's going on here?!
Yet another small matter is that Gen. FAMADEWA has no background (not unlike President Tinubu). Nothing in the public space right now tells us about his place of birth, early education and even his parentage. Though we grasp that he's a native of Ile-Ife in Osun State, all we are told is that he was a member of the 37 Regular Course of the NDA, commissioned into the Nigerian Army Intelligence Corps (NAIC) in September, 1990. It is fishy that one who rose to be a General in a country's army has a blank beginning.
Again, what's going on here?!
THE SPOOK WITH A LONG BEARD: Another very little matter: Gen. FAMADEWA wears a rich, well-tended, luxuriant grey beards under a dark, low-cropped hair. In essence, Famadewa doesn't present like the regular security chief. Famadewa looks more like a wild-eyed Nigerian politician on a mission to deliver a candidate by any means necessary. One wished Gen Famadewa would have gotten a clean shave upon being named for the job. Didn't they say that image is everything?
Spooks don't wear bushy beards!
Well, as has been noted, those are negligible matters. The big issue is that President Tinubu is doing an overhaul of the security system. He also seeks to firm up his personal security using his kinsman ahead of 2027.
But the schedule of duties of the ONSA and OSAHS are similar and the same, Viz: strengthening internal security coordination; improving intelligence-led operations and deepening collaboration among security agencies. What else does the ONSA do? Second, a huge, new bureaucracy is about to burgeon soon. Does anyone know the staff strength and bureaucratic appurtenances of the ONSA. We may soon have double this size in the OSAHS
It's troubling that while Ribadu was in the US doing photo-ops with Vice President JD Vance Tinubu was determining his office, turning it into a whited sepulchre for the reading of newspapers and drinking of Espresso coffees. The times are getting more interesting! NNL.