Former Nigeria’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Prof. Ibrahim Gambari, has urged Nigeria leaders to put dialogue and consultations at the center stage of solving security and challenges confronting the country.
He said this in his remarks at a joint summit on Terrorism, Insurgency and Incidence of Election Violence in Nigeria: Role of Security Agencies, organised by the Nigerian Army Resource Centre (NARC) in collaboration with the New Partnership for African Development (NEPAD).
Gambari also urged leaders to begin to summarise various recommendations from different summits, National Conferences and reports with a view to adopting them in solving various challenges facing the country.
“We must put resources in conflict resolution and peace building for the individual and society in general,” he said.
“Because you can have the physical security of the state, but have insecurity of the citizens. Therefore we must strive to build human security, and other elements such as political security, economic security, and environmental security.”
He said all citizens of the country must be united in fighting ills bedeviling the country, even as he warned political elites to desist from fanning the embers of violence in order to build a nation that is peaceful and prosperous for all.
“I want to say again and again that the sustainability of the Nigeria project for a united, peaceful, prosperous nation cannot depend on one person – not on President Muhammadu Buhari , or the military,” he said. “It is the responsibility of all of us. The traditional rulers, civil society organisations, Non-governmental organisation and the people, we have to stand united against violence of any kind and build a peaceful and prosperous Nigeria.
“It is unfortunate some of our political elites seem to have learnt nothing from history… because if they have learnt something they won’t be sounding the trumpet of war, believing that war is the solution to our problems, but it is not.
“They must stop fanning the embers of war and destruction for political and financial ends, because such attitude is not typical of nations that create strong national identity in its policies and among its people.”
Earlier in his remarks, Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai, who is also Chairman Board of Trustee of NARC, said since its establishment NARC had embarked on “laudable efforts towards achieving its core mandates of finding research based solutions to security and defence challenges”, which he said had attracted the collaboration with NEPAD.
