The Chief of Air Staff (CAS), Air Marshal Sadique Abubakar, has said efforts of security operatives at tackling insecurity will achieve better results if Nigerians partner with the military.
This, he said, could be done by providing timely information about the environment and neighbourhood to the security operatives. The Air Chief noted that the security of lives and property is not for the military alone to tackle but that everyone has a role to play.
Abubakar stated this while addressing reporters after delivering the second Distinguished Personality Lecture at the International Conference Centre of the University of Ibadan (UI), in the Oyo State capital.
The event, with the theme: Roles of the Nigerian Air Force in Internal Security Operations in Nigeria, was organised by the university’s Institute for Peace and Strategic Studies (IPSS).
Giving an overview of the lecture, the CAS said efforts of the military in the North had yielded positive results as they led to caging the Boko Haram insurgents to one section of the Northeast, adding that the insurgents had been substantially degraded, unlike what happened in 2014.
He said: “The Boko Haram insurgency is substantially degrading. There used to be explosions everywhere. If you recall, in 2014, from where we were coming to where we are now, Boko Haram is being caged in a section of the Northeast and we are fighting them daily. I can tell you that they have been substantially degraded. They are not able to come out as a force to really come up.
“From time to time, there might be some soft targets here and there. But we can’t be everywhere. Apart from that, I think you would agree with me that as compared to where we are coming, when bombs were exploding in United Nations headquarters and everywhere, the situation has changed substantially.
“The lecture is about the role of Nigerian Air Force (NAF) in resolving the internal security challenges facing Nigeria. The NAF is participating actively in all the internal security operations in the Northeast, the Northwest and Northcentral.”
UI Vice Chancellor, Prof Idowu Olayinka, who was represented by the Deputy Vice Chancellor (Administration), Prof Kayode Adebowale, said the lecture was part of the institution’s efforts to contribute positively to national security by bringing stakeholders to brainstorm and proffer solutions to issues and the challenges facing the country.
The Director of IPSS, Prof Tajudeen Akanji, noted that the choice of Abubakar for the lecture was deliberate.
He added: “The changing nature of internal security operations in the security sector, particularly in Nigeria, has revealed the increased strategic importance of NAF in the prosecution of the various operations.”
