Former Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Michael Aondoakaa has said the main problem Nigerians are faced with, is the issue of insecurity, adding that once that is fixed, the citizens would be able to feed themselves.
Aondoakaa said this in an interview with ARISE NEWS on Tuesday, while discussing the current state of the nation.
“The main issue now is that of security. Nigerians have the capacity to feed themselves. They are hardworking people. But now the farmers cannot go to farm. That is the basic reality, because of insecurity. The problem of hunger that we are having now is as a result of that. Most of our farmers don’t rely on imported rice or beans.
“They do everything for themselves and they contribute more to the economy of this country, I mean the GDP of the country. Now that aspect has been weakened because most of the major producing areas are under a siege. Talking about Jigawa, Kebbi, Sokoto, Kaduna, Niger and Benue. These are the basic food producing areas and now they can’t go to the farm because of the insecurity. If the insecurity is handled and people can go to the farm and we can have bumper harvest, then we can feed ourselves.
“If the issue of insecurity is not tackled, whatever the state government and federal government does, farmers cannot go to the farm. Our farmers who would never buy food, now go to the market to buy things like indomie to feed their children. These are the kinds of things that are putting pressure on the people to the extent that you have widespread complaints of hunger.”
Reacting to the issue of state policing, he said it would help in fixing the country only if they are excluded from political activities.
“During our time with President Yar’Adua we also brought the idea of state policing and if the present idea is conceived the way we conceived it, then it is possible for it to get us in a better place in terms of security. The framework of the state police will be the law made by the federal government; national assembly. In our case, we tried to define the limitations of state police.
“We excluded state police from all kinds of political activities. Elections, rallies and anything relating to politics. They will not be involved. So, I believe that now also, if the president is considering state police, the framework must be an enactment made by the national assembly, excluding the state police from participating in politics and confining them to the issue of crimes relating to terrorizing, kidnapping, any crime except the ones that has to do with political activities.”
Chioma Kalu
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