El-Rufai to ONSA: Demand for accountability is not politicisation of insecurity

Nasir el-Rufai, former governor of Kaduna, has accused the Office of the National Security Adviser (ONSA) of mismanaging the fight against insecurity in the country and attempting to silence critics by labelling them unpatriotic.

BACKGROUND

In an interview on Sunday, el-Rufai alleged that the federal government is paying bandits to dissuade them from killing Nigerians.

The former governor criticised what he described as a misguided “non-kinetic” approach to insecurity, and claimed that officials are paying and feeding bandits rather than eliminating them.

However, the ONSA dismissed el-Rufai’s claim, describing it as baseless and false.

The ONSA urged the former governor to refrain from politicising national security institutions, emphasising that the fight against banditry is a collective one and not a platform for political point-scoring.

El-Rufai also alleged that the Kaduna state government orchestrated the attack on the African Democratic Congress (ADC) event over the weekend.

In response, the state government accused him of seeking to destabilise the state through “provocation and manipulation.”

‘BE ACCOUNTABLE’

In a statement issued on Monday, el-Rufai said calls for accountability cannot be equated with playing politics.

“It is a well-known fact to discerning Nigerians that the face of the politicisation of national security for politically intended purposes resides, for the first time in our recent history, in the ONSA under its present leadership,” the statement reads.

“If the ONSA thinks Nigerians are not following its unclear and incompetent management of terrorism and banditry in Northern Nigeria and beyond, in collaboration with a certain senator, also from the North, then it is high time it carried out an in-depth evaluation and review of its actions.

“We are not the first to reveal the government’s ongoing greasing of the palms of non-state actors in Kaduna, Katsina, Zamfara, Sokoto, Niger, Kebbi, and other states.

“No matter how incompetent in security matters he may be, the National Security Adviser cannot be oblivious to videos and audios of traditional rulers, community leaders, and religious leaders condemning the payments made by the state to bandits.

“The attempt at denial falls flat as many citizens in the affected states have been following the counter-replies by community leaders and clerics on the issue of the government paying bandits.”

El-Rufai faulted what he called ONSA’s growing involvement in protocol and public relations duties instead of discreet intelligence coordination.

He accused the office of indulging in propaganda, such as parading victims allegedly “rescued” by security agencies when families had in fact paid ransoms.

“In the megalomania of the National Security Adviser, every attempt to hold him accountable is politicisation of security, every perceived enemy of his is a security risk, and every critic of a purportedly democratic government is unpatriotic. What a shame!

“In the same Kaduna, over a month ago, the ONSA and their Kaduna collaborator twisted an initiative of a foreign country to provide aid to indigent citizens into a narrative of donating houses to the victims of banditry in the state.

“Nigerians should dig deeper into that story and also visit and verify if the said victims are currently occupying those places after the politically-inspired media stunt.”

The former governor further criticised the Kaduna government for allegedly suppressing information on insecurity by muzzling local media, contrasting it with his administration’s publishing quarterly and annual reports on security incidents.

“The Kaduna State Government is obviously disappointed that the recent revelations by SaharaReporters and SBM Intelligence have shattered the false facade it had presented on kidnapping and other security issues,” he said.

“In response, the state government chose to quarrel with the data, which it knows to be true because it has consistently tried to suppress information on security incidents from reaching the public by muzzling or inducing the local media not to report such incidents.”

El’Rufai asked the ONSA and the Kaduna state government to publicise the location and details on how they are implementing the disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration of the “so-called repentant bandits”.