Former Vice President, Atiku Abubakar, on Tuesday, urged the President Muhammadu Buhari-led Federal Government to recall all ex-service personnel willing to return to fight terrorism.
Atiku made the call while urging the Buhari’s government to declare total war on terrorism in Nigeria.
In a statement titled, ‘The Time For A Total War On Terror Is Now,’ the former presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, urged the Federal Government to be decisive in leadership.
Atiku said: “The security situation in Nigeria is deteriorating rapidly and ordinary Nigerians are living in fear for their lives and the lives of their loved ones.
“Nowhere seems to be safe. Farms, markets, schools, homes, mosques, churches, and urban areas are all affected.
“Terrorists are spreading their areas of operation beyond the Northeast, into far-flung areas as far as Niger State in the North-Central. That is mere hours from our Federal Capital.
“Now is the time for decisive leadership and I call on the Federal Government to consider recalling all ex-servicemen and women, who are willing to return to service, and take the fight to the insurgents until they are rolled back and defeated.
“As a former vice-chairman of the National Security Council, I am aware that Nigeria has a sizeable population of military veterans, who are alive, and were trained locally and internationally, and it serves no purpose to allow these valuable national assets lie fallow when there is an existential threat to our nation.”
Atiku asked the Federal Government to immediately mobilise the ex-servicemen and women to combat the rising case of terror in the country.
He said: “Call them up. Immediately. Mobilise them to the field. The time has come for us to put in all our effort and stamp out this menace from our nation.
“The men and women of Nigeria’s armed forces, whether serving or retired, who restored peace to Lebanon, Liberia, Sierra Leone and São Tomé and Príncipe can and should be used to do the same in the motherland.
“But they need arms and ammunition. It is incumbent on the federal government to develop a more efficient means of sourcing weapons and delivering them to the troops at the battlefront.
“A situation where terrorists and criminals are better armed than our troops on the battlefront is intolerable.
“We need to urgently improve the conditions of service of the men and women of our armed forces. And not just the government.”
