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Juliana Taiwo-Obalonye
Mr. Victor Nwafor, the Officer-in-Charge (OC) of the Department of State Services (DSS) in the Presidential Villa, retired from the service on December 1st, 2017 after 35 years. Eight of those years were however spent in Aso Rock.
His last assignment was leading the Rece team to Cote d’Ivoire for the 5th European Union-African Union (EU-AU) Summit, which held from November 29th – 30th, with the theme: “Investing in the Youth for a Sustainable Development.” The deliberations focused on the raging issue of illegal migrants, many of who are Nigerians who dehumanised and sold as slaves in Libya.
Before the President departed for Nigeria at the end of the conference, Nwafor had the privilege of having a valedictory handshake with President Muhammadu Buhari, something he described as the high point of his career.
How long have you served in the Villa and how do you feel about your retirement?
I have been lucky I came into the Villa in 2010 and I had the singular opportunity to work with past president, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan and the current president, Muhammadu Buhari. The relationship between me and the current President dates back to 2006 when I was the Detail Officer to the Secretary to the Petroleum Trust Fund (PTF) and then at a point became the Security Officer of PTF in the new headquarters before one retired Colonel Abubakar was appointed. I was the one who handed over to him. Again in 2015, I also had the opportunity of working with him for a second time. The President has touched me in a very special way. In 2007 on my first trip abroad, he was the one who sent me and my principal to the United Kingdom and also the second time he was instrumental to that.
The high point was on November 29th, 2017 in Cote d’Ivoire, when the Chief Security Officer to the President informed him that I had served the nation for 35 years and that I would be disengaging from the service of DSS. So, he hugged me, thanked me and I reminded him of the special way he touched my life in 2007 and he laughed. He said yes he has been seeing me and appreciated my commitment to duty and asked me to remain dedicated even in my private life. He appreciated my contributions and said that I should keep in touch and that I should leave my contact address with my boss, the CSO.
He was very delighted and really appreciated my commitment to the system and then he granted me the singular opportunity of having a photograph with him, which I think is the high point of one’s career. At the end of the day if you are so lucky to have a photograph with the President of your country, I think it is the highest honour any civil servant or a private individual will want to wish himself. So to me, I feel fulfilled and greatly honored for the President to have a handshake with me and granted me the opportunity to have a photograph with him. So I think that is one of my takeaways.
Which were your most challenging moments of your years in the Villa?
In 2015 when the military came in to assume the duty of the DSS, that was the greatest challenging period for me as the Head of the DSS in the Presidential Villa. It was a situation nobody envisaged but we thank God we were able to manage it until normalcy was restored. That was the most challenging period and we thank God that we are back to statusquo and the boys of DSS have assumed their duties after those anomalies were corrected.
Did you encounter any situation that resulted in security breach in or out of the Villa?
Because the unit that was running the Close Body Protection was not designed for that, it was difficult trying to get things in the right perspective at the time. There were breaches but because we were not minding whether they were doing it right or wrong, because one was in the system we had to contribute to ensure that nothing went wrong. Throughout the period the president went out of the Villa, it was always a tensed moment for everybody because certain things were not being done rightly. There was high tension because they were not just cut out for that.
Eventually things were normalised because of the C-in-C’s intervention. We managed well because we were trained for that. I can assure you that the challenges were there but ours is to always be proactive in approach to functions and duties. It is a square peg in a square hole so we knew what to do, we know what to envisage because we were trained to do that. There could be some surprises because the heart of man is very deep but you can always do what you must do professionally; and then exigencies are there.
Also, there were one or two flash points not within Nigeria, especially during the last administration. We would go out of the country and people you never envisaged would be hostile suddenly turned to be hostile or due to insufficient intelligence on the impossible attitude of the people there it causes strains to the Close Body Protection. Like I told you, because the operatives were always up to it, embarrassing public situations were averted.
There was one ugly situation in Israel when somebody sprang a surprise but it was averted because of the alertness of the operatives. If the operatives were not trained for that, it could have been something else but thank God it was well averted. That is why it is always good to have trained operatives filling the posts they are trained for because guarding the president is not a tea-party. There is no moment the president is out there that there is no tension because you never can tell. So we always have a respite whenever the president is back to his base. Whenever he is out there, every operative is at his wits end to ensure that nothing goes wrong.
So, I thank God that for eight years I spent in the Presidential Villa I didn’t have any ugly story to tell. I have cause to glorify God for that. So when the President appreciates my contributions, I became fulfilled.
What was your daily routine like in the past eight years?
You know practice makes perfect, especially when you are doing the same thing over and over again, sometimes if there are shortfalls you try to improve on them. You know with repetitive duties things are dynamic, they are not regimented and like I said earlier, the heart of man is very deep. You know as days are evolving people are inventing new methods of crime that can create confusion for Close Body Protection unit. So you must be up to date.
What are you going to miss most as you retire from active service?
I’m not going to miss anything. I tell you I have every cause to be happy. I will only miss the good people that I had the opportunity to work with. You know we work as a family, especially when we go out. One good thing about the Presidential Villa is that all the units work as family and that is the espirit de corps that one is going to miss. But it is good relief that one is leaving when the ovation is loudest. I’m leaving at a time my services were appreciated by the president himself. And I have every reason to be grateful to my immediate boss, the Chief Security Officer to the president. He is a good commander and he is an inspiration to me because at a point when we had a rough time he was always there. There is nothing like having a boss who understands when they are challenges. He would always tell you, ‘look things will work out well one day’; and true to his proposition it turned out to be alright.
So what’s next as you go into retirement?
Well, retirement is a phase in one’s life. For 35 years you have been doing a particular job and when you are leaving it to move into another phase, you need God’s direction. I don’t want to play God, as I am disengaging from this now I want God to take the lead and direct me. If He has been with me this past 35 years I believe He will not be far from me and I look up to him for direction.
What is your advice to those you are leaving behind or those that will be posted to the Villa?
Working in the presidential Villa is the highest honour any operative from the service will wish himself because it is the melting pot in your career. You are working in the highest office in the land. You are not there primarily to make money, if you have money at the back of your mind, you are going to miss the point and you will not go far, you will run into trouble. You don’t need to go thinking money in the presidential Villa. First of all, you have to be committed; you have to love the job you are doing. It is only when you are committed that you will get results because there are a lot of challenges involved with protecting the number one citizen in the country. One, you have no life of your own to live. You come to work in the morning and developments will come that will take you off your family for the next one week or three as the case maybe. So you must be committed and you must be in love with such duty that will take you out for one or two weeks that you didn’t plan for and still be committed.
You must have that special interest and love to be able to give it your best. The moment you put in money first you will miss it and you know there is no way you can mix the two. So my advice to the ones in service is, be committed! The water you will drink can never flow pass you. If God says you are going to reach a certain place in your life, you may not even be there and it will still come to you. If you are in the Villa, first thing is commitment, second is commitment, and third is commitment, to your duty.
