Retired Maj.-Gen Garba Wahab, Director-General, Nigerian Army Resource Centre, has urged the judiciary to carry out due diligence in handling cases of terrorism, insurgency and banditry.
Wahab told newsmen on Friday in Abuja that the call became necessary to guard against impunity by perpetrators of such acts.
”Let the judiciary start doing their job because if we don’t, we are encouraging impunity,” he said.
Wahab said that the centre would look at the security issues during a roundtable to be held on Monday and Tuesday on “Asymmetrical National Security Challenges, the Army and National Development”.
He said that the security challenges in the country were well-known issues by all, adding that it behoves on all stakeholders to find lasting solutions to the myriad of the problems.
“We will like to trudge on to find a solution to the security challenges. We know the problems but what are the solutions?
“We have issues. We must find solutions; we must beg, if it means begging. This is our country and it must work.
“We must find a way to make sure things work in Nigeria. Prosecution is a two-way thing. The judge and the prosecuting officers must up their game.
“The judiciary must be up and doing. Series of allegations have been leveled and we are not leveling allegation against anybody, but we must work as a country,” Wahab said.
Also speaking, the Executive Director, Development Specs Academy, Prof. Okey Ikechukwu, said that the meeting with newsmen was organised as part of public engagements designed to strengthen public awareness on asymmetrical national security challenges.
“The essence of our special attention to our strategic partners is to emphasise the roles and relevance of credible and highly professional bodies, institutes and institutions as well as agencies of government that are headed by professionals in public communication and the media.”
He said that asymmetrical security challenges ranged from embedded targets, refusal of the average person to help the army and other security agencies with local intelligence.
“We become illiterate enough not to understand that it is our duty to provide that intelligence for us to be protected.
“So, that is a security challenge for those managing security, but it doesn’t take the standard form that they are familiar with, and they could refusal to help.”
Ikechukwu listed the partners to the planned roundtable to include the Nigerian Institute of Public Relations (NIPR), the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), Voice of Nigeria (VON), National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, among others.