Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), yesterday, said Nigerians should hold President Muhammadu Buhari responsible if terrorist attacks mar this year’s general elections.
Its National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, in a statement, condemned failure of the Nigerian leader to “use performance indexes to assess his appointees in the security and defence sector and his wont to appoint heads of security agencies based on nepotism and downright ethnic/religious considerations.”
The group demanded rejigging of the nation’s security architecture. Onwubiko said: “A President, who gladly extended the tenure of an IGP under whose watch police stations are bombed on a daily basis and operatives killed like chickens, is certainly not the kind of a statesman Nigerians expect to put out practical measures to stop violence before, during and after the elections.
“Already many rich Nigerians are flying out their families to Europe and America to stay until after the elections. HURIWA has a statistics of over 100 families that have left this month to Canada, USA and Great Britain to escape the violence related to the 2023 polls because the President has shown a lack of political will to combat these violent armed non-state actors.
“2023 election may be marred by uncontrollable violence because of the inability of President Buhari to demand accountability and use performance indexes to assess his appointees in the security and defence sector.
“For instance, two years ago, NIN (National Identity number) registration happened with the assurances that insecurity will fizzle out, but these attacks by terrorists, kidnappers and assassins, who now behead their victims, have escalated, yet the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Isa Pantami, said the National Security Adviser’s (NSA) office that has the responsibility of coordinating national security has not demanded data for purposes of fighting terrorism, but President Muhammadu Buhari has refused to rejig the security agencies and appoint more competent heads.”
