The Coalition of Northern Groups, CNG, has presented a northern regional security initiative “Shege Ka Fasa” for ratification by the governors of the region.
Briefing newsmen in Kaduna on Tuesday, CNG spokesman, Abdul-Azeez Suleiman, noted that for the past 12 years, the North has struggled with disabling challenges that include dwindling economy, rising poverty and more worrying, a crippling security situation that has taken a huge toll in lives, property and the overall cohesion of the region.
CNG observed that, “The situation manifested in 2008 in the form of a deadly insurgency from the Northeast and within a short time, spread to other parts of the region and virtually turned the entire region into a battlefield. While the insurgency raged, other disturbances were created in the region in the form of cattle rustling that pitched northern communities against each other.
“A new dimension was introduced to the farmers/herders conflict which gradually deteriorated into an uncontrollable proportion and deepened the artificial rift between communities in the region.
“This trend suddenly metamorphosed into a deadly armed banditry and kidnapping for ransom which is recycled for arms and drugs. This is in addition to another frustrating trend of the theft and forced trafficking in northern children to other parts of the country for reasons that are largely dubious.
“The culmination of these security challenges has for the past decade turned the entire region into a house of horror with violent killings reported on a daily basis, communities displaced with formal and informal IDP camps spreading across the region.”
The northern groups said, “The situation today, on most northern highways, innocent travelers are waylaid, robbed and abducted, towns and villages attacked and sacked by bandits who have created an atmosphere of palpable fear across the region.”
Following the security challenges in the region, CNG explained, “We call the attention of all governors of northern states to the urgent necessity to join their counterparts in the South-West and South-East by adopting and ratifying this initiative for northern regional security and providing the necessary legal framework for its operation in order to secure the lives of the people that are in constant threat.
“CNG resolved to formalize this request by writing to the governors through the Northern Governors Forum and to the leaderships of traditional, religious and cultural institutions in the region.
“Restates that if the state governments and other leaders of the region fail to take action to protect the region the way their southern counterparts are doing, CNG is willing to follow through with all the processes of obtaining the required legal backing for the outfit from the relevant federal authorities.”
CNG drew the attention of the authorities concerned that it is absolutely impossible to expect that communities would continue to fold their arms while criminals invade their abodes, kill, abduct and displace them.
“By this, today we unveil the symbols for the Shege Ka Fasa outfit which would be formally inaugurated in the coming few weeks when all necessary legal processes might have been completed or formally adopted and ratified by the northern states governors,” CNG said.
The groups further observed, “initiated practical measures for the setting up of a northern regional security outfit to compliment the efforts of the police, the military, the security services to detect, expose and defeat all criminal machinations and carry out specific and general tasks that would realign the attitude and thinking of the public with the ideals and objectives of the founding fathers of the region.
“The outfit, codenamed “Shege Ka Fasa” is designed to be the vanguard of the entire North encompassing every ethnic group and religion and to be deeply patriotic in its operation.”
