By Ngwuoke Ngwuoke
Chief of the Air Staff, Air Marshal Hasan Abubakar, has commended Governor Peter Mbah of Enugu State on improved security of lives and property in the state, saying Mbah’s commitment to maintaining very good working relationship with the armed forces would continue to bring enhanced peace and security in the South East region.
He was speaking on Thursday during a courtesy call on Mbah, when he led the top echelon of the service on a working visit to Enugu State, noting that Mbah was the first governor to visit him upon his appointment to seek collaboration towards the security of his state.
Abubakar said the Nigeria Air Force had recently invigorated its operations for peace and security in the region through air components of the joint task force, Operation Udoka II, headquartered in Enugu by injecting a fresh set of troops.
He commended the governor’s vision and determination to eradicate poverty, noting that 75 per cent of crime eradication was non-kinetic and applauded Mbah for his “zeal and mission to deliver quality, people-focused governance by making Enugu State the preferred destination for tourism, business, investment and living.
“It has been empirically proven that poverty and issues of criminality are directly proportional. The more poverty you have, the more likely that people will go into criminal activities.
“The issue of insecurity is usually very complex, multifaceted, and requires multifaceted and very comprehensive approaches to resolve them; and we are very happy to identify with a lot of efforts at resolving some of these problems, particularly your plans to eradicate poverty in the state by addressing all the indices of poverty
“Again, we can continue to carry out our kinetic actions to address the issues of insecurity, but again, empirically, it has been proven that only 25 per cent of internal security issues can be resolved using kinetic means. The remaining 75 per cent can be resolved using the whole of government approach.
“This whole of government approach has to do with the eradication of poverty, illiteracy, good education, medical care, and all the issues. I am very happy to see that a lot of these issues you are already addressing; which means that your policies and plans align with this whole of government approach.”
The service chief equally applauded Mbah for ending the illegal Monday sit-at-home and for waging war against fake news purveyors, especially on the social media, whom he described as “media terrorists”, who use fake news to stir tension and insecurity.
“I also want to commend your stand against the illegal sit-at-home order. You are taking a very strong stance against it. You have also resolved to take legal action against the perpetrators and facilitators of this illegal order”, he said.
Responding, Mbah said his administration needed to take hard a stance against insecurity as it was impossible to grow the state’s economy from the present $4.4 billion to $30 billion in a state of insecurity, reiterating that the government was taking deliberate measures to create employment to fight the crime industry.
“The typical thing is that you cannot have sustainable development without security. Conversely, you cannot have security without sustainable development. So, they are both intricately intertwined and we need to address them frontally. So, we also thought that if we must deal insecurity, we must deal with the root causes. And dealing with the root causes requires that we address unemployment so we can get our young people constructively and gainfully engaged in other useful activities other than criminalities”, he said.
