A group, Nigeria All Patriots Assembly (NAPA) has called for the sack of the country’s service chiefs due to the mounting insecurity across Nigeria, even as it called on pressure groups, cultural organizations, civil society groups, students, among other concerned Nigerians to join it proposed mass protest.
NAPA has gone a step further to organise a sensitization rally to protest the continued stay of the service chiefs in office at the popular Gani Fawehinmi Freedom Park, Ojota, Lagos on Monday, March 16.
In a statement sent to journalists on Monday, March 9 by its director of communications, Bolanle Oluwaseyi, the group said there is a need for urgent mass action to salvage Nigeria from its current travails.
Part of the statement read: “We are witnesses to the serial multi-sectoral damage done to our collective national interest that has adversely affected the economy, social cohesion, politics and every other national development index in the last five years.
“First, there was the total mutilation of the electoral system by discarding all rules of fairness, credibility, decency and inclusivity that are basic demands for every working democracy.
“This was followed by the emasculation and bastardization of the nation’s justice system by vandalizing the established judicial regulations and turning the judiciary into a temple no longer of justice, but of suppression of the popular will of the people.
“As if these were not enough, we are today faced with maniacal desperation to mortgage our collective security by compromising the entire national security structure. Insecurity in Nigeria: Catholics protest in Abuja over nationwide killings
“As the nation reels in harsh economic realities and a thriving criminal industry take a huge daily toll through insurgency, banditry, kidnapping, ethnic and religious conflicts, the administration has stubbornly refused to heed calls to review and adjust its ineffective security arrangements.
“Calls from the nation’s National Assembly, the civil society, religious and cultural leaderships and even subtle rebukes from a section of the international community have been swept aside by an unrepentant club of a few who have caged the presidency and held the entire nation captive.
“In the wake of these unfolding realities and the unyielding destructive stand of the clannish federal leadership, the entire country is gripped by palpable fear, traumatic uncertainty and agonizing daily losses to lives and properties.”
The group said it has become necessary for a mass mobilization to rescue Nigeria. It said the mass protests will among other things:
1. Expose the ineffectiveness, incompetence, contradictions, partisan affiliation and professional compromise of the current service chiefs and heads of other security agencies.
2. Expose the serial lies, complacency, doublespeak and deceit of particularly the Chief of Army Staff and his determined desperation to suppress the truth and contrary views.
3. Demand for the immediate sack of the service chiefs and heads of other security agencies and a complete overhaul of the national security machinery.
4. Demand for the consequent probe of the activities of the sacked service chiefs and their conspirators in the last five years.
NAPA called on pressure groups, cultural organizations, civil society groups, students, women, trade and labour unions and on other concerned Nigerians to join its protest which it noted, will be held nationwide after the Lagos rally.
