Amotekun: It’s time to address issues of nationhood and reset Nigeria on path to progress – Bakare

The Serving Overseer of the Citadel Global Community Church, formerly known as The Latter Rain Assembly, Pastor ‘Tunde Bakare, has said that the formation of the newly instituted Western Nigeria Security Network, code-named ‘Operation Amotekun’ and the controversy that greeted it presents an opportunity to examine the foundations of Nigeria’s nationhood and trash the lingering contentious constitutional question.

According to him, the arguments that greeted the sensitive issue of Amotekun has “sparked some form of ideological debate and created a semblance of leftist, rightist and centrist approach to policy discourse.

This is what democracy is all about and, if well managed by political actors, this discourse can provide us with an opportunity to strengthen our federal governance architecture.”

Pastor Bakare who expressed his views in on yesterday in the auditorium of the Citadel Global Community Church with the theme “No Amount of Ringworm Medicine Can Cure Leprosy”, also stated that scrutiny of the arguments for and against Amotekun would reveal a recurring reference to the issues which the country has failed to deal with over the past decades.

According to him, at the turn of every decade in Nigeria there have always been issues to call the nation to have a serious rethink over its continued corporate existence, saying, “every January of a new decade has presented our nation with a major contentious national question that not only reveals the flaws in our present constitution, but also challenges us to revisit our national foundations and renegotiate, as it were, “a more perfect Union.”

“In the year 2000, it was the question of the constitutionality of state religious laws when, on the 27th of January that year, Sharia law was instituted in Zamfara State – a step that was soon replicated by eleven other states in the Northern part of our nation.

I recall how the then president waved aside the ensuing bitter regional and religious contentions and labeled the matter “political Sharia,” even as we, as a nation, swept the issues under the carpet, instead of candidly addressing the underlying questions of constitutionalism and nationhood at the table of brotherhood.

“In January 2010, at the turn of yet another new decade, the wake-up call was the sensitive question of regional governance rotation at a time when the incapacitation of a sitting president led to power hijack by a cabal in the presidency.

“Although that situation led to an unprecedented people movement that forced the National Assembly to invoke the Doctrine of Necessity to bridge constitutional gaps, and although the lawmakers followed up that action with subsequent constitutional amendments, the palpable tensions that continue to define governance transition periods in Nigeria, especially among the different zones, attest to the fact that the underlying foundational issues are yet to be resolved.

“And now, in January 2020, at the commencement of another decade (of our monopoly democracy), the contentious constitutional question that once more beckons on us to examine the foundations of our nationhood relates to the newly instituted Western Nigeria Security Network, code-named “Operation Amotekun.”

He noted that “The proponents of Amotekun, particularly in the South, justify the move by referencing the Sharia police or Hisbah as a northern version of regional policing. The opponents, on the other hand, particularly from the North, express fears of possible regional political motivations.

“These are clear indications that the issues we swept under the carpet in past decades are still staring us in the face. We cannot continue to hide under the umbrella of one finger. It is time to address the underlying issues of nationhood and reset Nigeria on the path to predictable progress.”

He further stated: “The way forward for these recurring questions of federalism, including that of regional or state policing, is neither to the left nor to the right, nor is it in the centre of the discourse;

the way forward is to travel downwards to revisit the constitutional foundations while looking upwards with unwavering faith in our divinely ordained destiny as one strong, united nation, with a strong federal government and strong federating units; a nation in which government as an entity is close enough to serve the people and strong enough to protect them.

“We must not lose sight of the main issue in the Operation Amotekun debate, which is that the current mono-level security architecture has proved inadequate to combat the security challenges that confront not just the South-West but every zone in our nation – security challenges such as kidnapping, herdsmen attacks, cattle rustling, terrorism and the porosity of our borders.”

Concluding, he emphasised the urgent need to focus attention on youth unemployment and restiveness: “…good as the Amotekun Security outfit and similar initiatives across the nation are, we will have fewer security challenges when government at all levels focuses urgent attention on job creation for the massive army of jobless youths in our nation.

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“Youth joblessness is the breeding ground for the various forms of crime that have bedevilled our land. Evidently, ‘idle hands are the devil’s workshop.’ Even our present constitution, flawed as it is, stipulates that ‘the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government.’

“Consequently, we cannot prioritise the security of the citizens above the welfare of the citizens; the two must go hand in hand. When that happens, the crime rate will drastically drop as our youths across the length and breadth of the federation are gainfully employed or helped to become job creators themselves.”