Security crisis: FG not learning from past attacks

From Ndubuisi Orji, Abuja

Former Vice President Atiku Abubakar has said that one of the federal government’s greatest failures in the fight against insecurity is that it is not drawing lessons from past attacks by bandits, kidnappers and other criminals.

Atiku, in a statement by his Senior Special Assistant on Public Communication, Phrank Shaibu, on Thursday, said the worrisome expansion of terrorism, banditry and kidnapping from the North to other parts of the country is evidence that the country’s current counter-terrorism framework is not evolving as rapidly as the threats it was designed to tackle.

He noted that the fundamental question that should trouble every Nigerian is why the government is incapable of learning from past terror attacks, when the terrorists themselves are learning, adapting and improving their methods after every attack.

Atiku, who is also the African Democratic Congress (ADC) 2027 presidential candidate, said Nigeria can no longer afford a business-as-usual approach to terrorism. According to him, it is imperative to urgently recalibrate the nation’s security architecture to reflect the realities of a threat landscape that is becoming more sophisticated, decentralised and geographically expansive.

He said, “The terrorists are learning from every attack. They study their successes and failures. They refine their tactics. They identify vulnerabilities. They adapt and strike again. The question Nigerians must ask is simple: Why isn’t the government doing the same?

“From Chibok to Oyo, from countless villages in the North-West to communities across the Middle Belt and beyond, the pattern has become tragically familiar. An attack occurs. The nation mourns. Promises are made. Committees are announced. Then another attack follows.

“A nation that refuses to learn from its tragedies is condemned to relive them.

“The disturbing expansion of banditry, terrorism and kidnapping across different parts of the country clearly demonstrates that our current counter-terrorism framework is no longer adequate for the scale and complexity of the challenge before us.

“It is now imperative that the federal government immediately initiates a comprehensive review of Nigeria’s National Counter-Terrorism Policy. Such a review must be rooted in Nigeria’s own experiences, drawing lessons from communities that have suffered attacks and developing context-specific, adaptive and community-driven solutions rather than depending largely on foreign templates.

“We went through the harrowing tragedy of the Chibok schoolgirls’ abduction. The pain of that national trauma remains etched permanently in our collective memory. Yet years later, schoolchildren and teachers are still being abducted in different parts of the country. We ought to have drawn critical lessons and early warning indicators from Chibok and other similar incidents to ensure that what recently happened in Oyo State and elsewhere never happens again.”

Atiku proposed the establishment of a Terrorism Violence Peer Review Mechanism, a structured platform that would enable communities, local leaders, security personnel and stakeholders from previously affected areas to share experiences, document lessons, evaluate response strategies and contribute practical insights to national security planning.

This mechanism, according to him, would significantly strengthen grassroots intelligence gathering, improve early warning systems, enhance community resilience and deepen collaboration between local populations and security agencies.

“The battle against terrorism cannot be won solely through military deployments. While kinetic operations remain necessary, the government must aggressively target the financial lifelines of terrorist groups. We must identify and dismantle the networks that fund, equip, transport and shelter these criminal elements.

“Every successful counter-terrorism campaign around the world has relied heavily on intelligence superiority. Nigeria must therefore invest massively in intelligence gathering, surveillance technology, aerial monitoring systems, communication interception capabilities and data-driven threat analysis.

“Communities must become active partners in national security. Citizens are often the first to notice suspicious movements long before security agencies arrive. We need structured community intelligence programmes backed by trust, incentives and witness protection mechanisms.

“The federal government should establish specialised Counter-Terrorism Fusion Centres in each geopolitical zone where intelligence from the military, police, DSS, civil defence, immigration, customs, local vigilantes and community leaders can be pooled, analysed and acted upon in real time.

“Equally important is the need to strengthen border security. Nigeria’s porous borders have become highways for the movement of terrorists, arms traffickers and transnational criminal networks. A nation that cannot effectively monitor who enters and exits its territory will continue to face serious security vulnerabilities,” the ADC candidate stated.

Atiku, while urging the government to invest in education, youth employment and rural development, also proposed the creation of a National Victims and Survivors Support Framework to ensure that communities devastated by terrorist attacks receive structured psychosocial support, educational opportunities for affected children, rehabilitation assistance and economic recovery programmes.

Furthermore, he noted that “What is particularly troubling is that despite trillions of naira budgeted for defence and security over the years, Nigerians are less secure today than they were a decade ago. Terrorists have become more mobile, bandits more audacious, kidnappers more sophisticated, and communities more vulnerable. This is not merely a failure of resources; it is a failure of strategy, coordination, accountability and leadership.

“The government must increase investment in intelligence-led policing, surveillance capabilities and community engagement initiatives.”