Former Chief of Defence Staff, General Lucky Irabor (retd.), has alleged that some politicians in Nigeria are exploiting and even financing insecurity in the country for political advantage.
Irabor made the disclosure during an interview on Channels Television on Monday, stressing that Nigeria’s security challenges are too complex to be blamed on a single cause.
His comments came barely 24 hours after a presidential aide, Daniel Bwala, revealed that the Federal Government was preparing to publicly name individuals suspected of funding terrorism.
Speaking on the nature of the country’s security threats, Irabor warned against sweeping generalisations that classify all violent activities under one category.
According to him, Nigeria is confronted with multiple layers of security threats including ideological, criminal, political and economic violence that operate simultaneously.
“You cannot hold people for their views, but the reality is that our security challenges are multifaceted. Just as we have terrorists driven by ideology, we also have those targeting Christians, as well as groups seeking to displace communities in order to dominate those areas,” he said.
The former defence chief explained that terrorists, bandits, community displacers and economic criminals operate with different motives, making the crisis difficult to simplify.
“If you lump everything into one category, the analysis will be wrong,” he added.
Addressing claims that insecurity in Nigeria is purely political, Irabor acknowledged that political interests play a role but insisted that they do not account for all violent incidents across the country.
He stated that attributing all security problems solely to politics ignores the broader social, economic and ideological factors driving violence nationwide.
