Kailani Muhammad, national chairman, Civilian Joint Task Force (CJTF), says if the federal government empowers and supports CJTF with advanced technology and equipment, it will crush bandits in one year.

Mr Muhammad said this when Charles Omini, special envoy/Ambassador to West Africa for International Human Rights Protection Service/Forum, presented him with a Certificate of Partnership as chairman of the West African JTF in Abuja on Saturday.

According to him, the government should give the Civilian JTF the necessary support to see what they will do; we will crush them.

“If actually we mean business, we know, even in the states where all these things are happening, we know their locations, we know where they are,” he said.

The CJTF chairman also urged President Bola Tinubu to sign an undertaking with all the service chiefs in collaboration with the CJTF to wipe out insecurity in one year.

“We are calling on Mr President to give all the security chiefs a timeline of one year. They should sign an undertaking, and in the next one year, in collaboration, they will work with us to make sure that we wipe out insecurity in Nigeria.

“If they don’t do it, they should resign. They will bring some group to come and do the job. They should not just leave them like that. They should put them on their toes,” the CJTF chairman said.

He said that the federal government should empower and support the CJTF with the necessary equipment and advanced technology to combat security challenges in the country.

“Our borders are very porous. And we know that there are about 2,000 inlets and exits around our country. So, we have already identified those routes.

“If the government can help us, we need to put CCTV as it’s obtained in Mexico now and America.

“So, these should be positioned 100 kilometres where you see the influx of these hoodlums, all these bandits coming, through intelligence. We have AI now,” Mr Muhammad said.

Also speaking, Mr Omini called for systematic approach and strategic collaboration among security agencies to combat insecurity confronting the country.

According to him, security is everyone’s business because we all yearn for a peaceful, safe environment. I have never seen one person winning or combating security.

“I think I will, at this point, call on the security heads at all levels to come up with very strong strategic collaborations and partnerships with the relevant agencies and organisations at all levels.

“Security is not what you handle by running on the street like a mad person. Security, on its own, has a strategic and systemic approach.

“You see, we find ourselves in a global and digital world. I will appeal at this point, the security agencies should engage more of advanced technology to combat these challenges.

“There are a whole lot of technological approaches that if the different security agencies at all levels come up with these approaches technologically, I think we should be able to solve the security challenges confronting Nigeria.

“Another thing we have to do as a country is dialogue. We need to talk to our people. We need to know that if you destroy one, you are destroying everybody and you are destroying yourself.

“Those who are carrying arms, who are kidnapping, for how long are they going to do this? We are appealing to them; they are destroying our economy and they are destroying our government. So these killings must stop, this kidnapping must stop.

“Enough is enough and it is not something that the government will do alone. So, the security agencies and the Nigerian government have to understand that there have to be strategic collaborations at all levels to make sure we wipe insecurity out of Nigeria.”

(NAN)