Former Chief of Defence Staff, General Lucky Irabor (rtd), says political leadership must take full ownership of the war against Boko Haram insurgency and wider insecurity in the country, stressing that it cannot be defeated through military force alone.
Irabor said this on Friday in an interview with Arise Television while talking about his new book ‘Scars: Nigeria’s Journey and the Boko Haram Conundrum’.
He stated that successive governments had failed to provide the legal and political framework necessary to end the conflict.
“What I see, and I was very clear in the book, is that the government, past and present, has not seen the need to declare war with the necessary legal instruments against Boko Haram and all forms of insecurity across the country.
“There is no declaration from the National Assembly saying we are in a state of war. Without that, parts of the constitution that ought to be suspended for a proper war effort are not activated, and all elements of state power are not deployed,” he said.
Irabor, who led ‘Operation Lafiya Dole’, recalled key battlefield successes during his tenure, including the capture of Alagano, clearance of the Sambisa Forest and the elimination of senior Boko Haram commanders.
“It would have been a good thing to see Boko Haram extinguished during the presidency of the late President Muhammadu Buhari.
But conflicts of this nature are not chessboard games. Being a military strategist does not mean you can solve every violent problem with military precision. That is why the book calls for a paradigm shift – using other elements of state power, not just the hard power of the military,” he added.
