A former governor of Plateau State, Fidelis Tapgun, on Sunday offered a solution on how the state can end the incessant killings and attacks in the communities and other parts of the state.
In an interview with The PUNCH in Jos, Tapgun said his solution to the lingering insecurity in the state is for “an urgent reorganization of the security architecture in the state.”
He insisted that, if early warning signals were not detected and addressed squarely as presently obtains, the problem would continue to linger.
He also said that every community in the 17 local government areas of the state should be strengthened to play greater role in the area of information gathering for the safety of the people.
The former Governor’s comment came days after terrorists invaded several communities in Mangu Local Government Area and killed over 100 persons with their properties worth millions of naira destroyed.
Reacting to the development and others in the state, the former Ambassador to Kenya insisted that the security challenge that had bedeviled the state for a long time was not insurmountable.
Tapgun said, “The security situation in Plateau State is a very unfortunate one and my heart goes out to the families of the victims. But I don’t know how the security architecture in the state is presently organized but whatever it is, there is the need for it to be reviewed.
“Before I became governor, I grew up in the civil service and served as the secretary of the local government in the state as well as the sole administrator up to the Cabinet Office, where I served in the special services department and the security department. What I knew at that time was that, in the 1980s, every LGA chairman was the chief security officer in his LGA. And in every LGA, there was a security committee headed by the chairman and which comprised of various groups including traditional rulers, ward heads, market traders’ association, DPOs, DSS, and taxi drivers who meet every Monday of the week.
“These groups hunt for Information happening in their various areas and reports were received from these categories of groups such that if there was going to be any problem or security breach of any kind, you get the information immediately and would be able to address the issue. And then, all the reports were summarized and sent back to the LGAs from where they get to the state government through the office of the secretary to the state government for onward dispatch to the office of the National Security Adviser. Such security arrangement worked effectively during the 80s, and I think there is the need for the incoming administration to revisit that model and reintroduce it for the safety of our people in Plateau State and Nigeria at large.”
