President Goodluck Jonathan has made a request to the National Assembly for the extension of the state of emergency in Adamawa, Borno and Yobe states. Do you support the extension?

The extension of the emergency rule is justified.  The emergency rule as presently constituted is positively affecting the campaign against insurgency in the North-East zone.  Before the emergency rule was imposed in the zone, there were of series of attacks in major cities in the zone and the capitals of the states. But since the presence of the military came to the zone, the attacks have been reduced in the capital cities such that the insurgents have now moved to the suburb or villages.

I want to believe that the reason why they have continued to exist in the suburbs is because the emergency rule as declared in the states are not presently well-constituted in those suburbs. I believe it is helping and that the President has taken the right step in requesting for the extension of the emergency rule in the zone.

Can you give further justification for the extension?

If things have returned to normalcy, nobody will be asking that it be extended. But one may say the situation is getting worse to the extent that we need external forces to fight for us. So, if we need that much help from outside of the country, it only means that the country is saying it is not time to suspend emergency rule in that zone.

Since the President has taken steps to ensure that he does it constitutionally for the protection of the lives and properties of the citizens in that zone, it is something we should embrace and support. Personally, I support it.

The opposition party, the  All Progressives Congress, sees it as a way to suppress the party, its leaders and supporters in the area by the Federal Government.

It is an unfortunate thing in this country now that everything is argued along political lines. We do not seem to think about reasons and merits about anything we do in this country again.  If anything happens, the All Progressives Congress will begin to blame the Peoples Democratic Party and if any goes wrong, the PDP will begin to talk against the opposition.  I think we should grow beyond that.

We should look beyond politics in what is happening to us in this country; in what we do to ourselves;  in the way we tackle problems in this country and the way we see things. We should look at things positively and with genuine interest and not  with political interest. That is why we are not getting some of these things right because people continue to think and argue along political line. The North-East is not the only zone where there are APC governors and supporters. There are other states. Like Kwara State is an APC state, Lagos is an APC state, for instance, why has the President not declared emergency rule in those states? He has not done that because there are no situations for that.

Do you support a total state of emergency where all the democratic apparatus will be collapsed?

If that had happened, that is when people would be saying the Federal Government is doing that because it wants to suppress the people in those states. And it is because of the fact that he does not want to be seen as removing the governors because they do not support the government, that is why President Goodluck  Jonathan  decided on partial state of emergency.

 I will support that there should be a total state of emergency. If the governors of those states are not capable of maintaining  security in those states, state of emergency should be total so that we will know that we actually have security challenge in that zone. If total emergency rule is declared, it only means that there will be no election since there will be no need for civilian governors, commissioners, or local government chairmen. It should be total. The military leaders there will not be elected to rule the state. There will only be appointed administrators.

There will be no governorship election; there will also be no presidential election. It will not be a political minus to any political party if they declare total emergency rule in that zone. It means no body will claim any electoral value for that place.

How do you feel about the continued captivity of over 200 girls from Government Day Secondary School,, Chibok?

Nobody is happy about that. We all pray that the girls will come back safely and alive. We pray that this should stop in this country or any part of the world. We all pray that no body, child or adult be abducted or kidnapped.

 Should the FG negotiate with Boko Haram towards exchanging  the sect’s prisoners for the abducted girls?

I think it will be wrong for the Federal Government to use that to negotiate with these insurgents in this matter. It is directly affecting Nigeria but it is now an international issue. So it is not just that President Goodluck Jonathan will sit in his office and decide that he will release all the prisoners of the Boko Haram sect. I do not think it is a good idea for the Federal Government to use that to negotiate.

But people are worried that if the government does not negotiate with the sect, they may kill the girls?

If they had burnt the school with the girls, what would we have been saying now? Should we be saying that we should negotiate with all their prisoners so that they would not bomb any other place? And who told you that if the Boko Haram prisoners are released, they would not constitute another security challenge?   How are you sure that they will not go and kidnap other people somewhere?  Do you have security assurance that if they release the Boko Haram suspects in exchange for those girls, they would not kidnap another set of students?

If the Federal Government can assure us that if the prisoners are released, they will be of good behaviour, of course, as a concerned Nigerian, I will support the negotiation but as it is now, I do not support it because I do not believe it will insurgency to an end.

 What’s the solution to insecurity?

Prayer! As it is, you cannot be sure of anything. With the way the situation is now, the best we can do as Nigerians is to be prayerful. The government must to try its best to ensure that the security situation in the country is stable. The citizens should cooperate with the military, offer useful information and abide by relevant instructions.  There is also the need for security agencies to step up intelligence gathering. The equipment and ammunition available to security agencies should be updated to more sophisticated and modern standards.