NSA MUNGONO’S INTERVIEW: BETWEEN FRUSTRATION AND SABOTAGE.

                     BY
       Abubakar Mustapha

The 195 million audiences/listeners of the British Broadcasting Corporation, BBC woke up on Friday, 12th March 2021 to tune on to the BBC Hausa service for their usual search of current happenings surrounding them, only to be disgusted, astonished and disappointed with the responses of Nigeria’s National Security Adviser, retired Major General Babagana Mungono to some questions bordering on National Security of the nation.
In that interview, Babagana Mungono was speaking like an opposition of the government he is serving as the National Security Adviser.
The interview has projected General Mungono retired as the dullest National Security Adviser Nigeria ever had. He shows that the National Security Adviser has been operating alone without his principal, the president. It is also an indication that he has been responsible for the inability of the nation’s security architecture to completely conquer the war against insurgents in the northeast and rural armed bandits in the northeast of Nigeria within the shortest possible time.
It shows that either the NSA is incompetent to hold that position or he has been sabotaging the security agencies in the fight against insurgency and other criminality across the breadth and length of this country.
It was an indication that the NSA was unable to coordinate the security outfits to form a coalition of a strong and powerful military in the fight against the insurgents. This is why there is no synergy between and amongst the security agencies in the fight against the insurgents.
How can a nation’s Security Adviser to the President of the country, inform the world that he is not on top of issues regarding his country’s security? It is an indication that the NSA has been passive and inactive in the discharge of his duties or he has wasted the whole Six years he spent as NSA fighting those he perceived as his enemies within the government.
More astonishing is his u-turn of the statements he made in the interview after all the damages had been made to the nation’s security arrangements, this:
“The attention of the Office of the National Security Adviser has been drawn to some media reports regarding Armed Forces equipment during an interview with the BBC Hausa service. We would like to State that the NSA was quoted out of context as he did not CATEGORICALLY say that funds meant for arms procurement were missing under the Former Service Chiefs as reported or transcribed by some media outlets from the BBC interview. During the interview, the National Security Adviser only reiterated the Federal Government’s commitment to deal decisively with insecurity and stated President Muhammadu Buhari’s continued commitment to provide all necessary support to the Armed Forces, including the provision of arms and equipment.”
A former BBC staff Bala Ibrahim in an analysis on this matter quoted the NSA as saying in the BBC interview, “Ai ba jan qafa bane yake kawo wannan matsalar. Shugaban kasa yayi qoqari, ya bada kudade na fitar hankali, amma BAA SIYO KAYAN BA. Kayan basu isa ba. Saboda haka yanzu, ya kawo sababbin mutane, wata qila su zasu samu wata dabara. Kuma bance wadancan na bayan wadanda sukayi murabus sun hadiye kudaden ba, amma dai KUDIN SUN BI TA WATA HANYA DA BAN SANI BA, BA WANDA YA SANI A YANZU.”
This is a very serious security lapse on the part of NSA Mungono which clearly indicates his incompetence to continue holding that very sensitive position, especially considering his inaction which is responsible for the massacre of hundreds of thousands of our people.
No wonder, the ENDSARS protest nearly paralysed this nation, if not for the intervention of the Nigerian Army.
In view of the above and for the sake of saving Nigerian lives, the president and Commander in chief of the Nigerian Armed Forces, Muhamnadu Buhari GCFR, should as a matter of urgency, take immediate action against this man to face the war squarely against the mayhem being unleashed on our innocent people, by bandits and the Boko Haram insurgents, especially in our rural communities.

Abubakar Mustapha writes from Kaduna, at no 268B Magadushu Area.