The Arewa Youth Assembly, a Northern organization, demanded the dismissal of Major General Babagana Monguno (retd), the National Security Adviser, after the British High Commission and the American Embassy issued warnings to their nationals about an impending terrorist strike in Abuja.
The organization has asked that the National Security Adviser be fired by President Muhammadu Buhari, in August 2022, or face widespread protests.
The group had issued a 14-day deadline for President Buhari on August 1 and then protested the President’s failure to remove the NSA from his position.
The National Security Agency (NSA), all heads of the Department of State Services, the National Intelligence Agency, as well as the Service Chiefs—Lt. General Frouk Yahaya, Air Marshal Isiaka Amao, and Vice Admiral Awwal Gambo—have all been called for immediate dismissal in a statement made by the Arewa Youth Assembly Speaker, Mohammed Danlami, in Kaduna on Friday.
Meanwhile, the group of youths from Abuja and the 19 northern states demanded that the President move to Kaduna or even his native state of Katsina because the security agents he had chosen to protect him and other Nigerians had proven to be ineffective.
The group finds it absurd that the intended terrorist assault had to be revealed by American assistance despite the country’s massive defense expenditure and the purchase of equipment to facilitate intelligence collection.
They claimed that the US and UK’s disclosure of the security threat to Abuja, the country’s capital, was evidence that the head of the country’s security architect was unwell.
The statement partly read, “The Arewa Youth Assembly, the apex umbrella body of northern Nigeria youths groups has stated that following the security advisory by United States of America’s Embassy in Nigeria to their staff and citizens over imminent terrorists attack in Abuja, which is gradually turning the nation’s capital to a ghost town, has vindicated us over our earlier call for the sack of the National Security Adviser (NSA), Gen. Mohammed Babagana Monguno Rtd.
“It is unimaginable, that despite the astronomic increase in our security budget and procurement of equipments to aide intelligence gathering, it took the intervention of the US to expose the plans of the terrorists to attack our nation’s capital.
“Since our persistent call coupled with protests for the sacking of the NSA fell on deaf ears, it is important for us to let President Muhammadu Buhari realise that terrorists can plan his kidnap for ransom and succeed, if he continues with the present heads of intelligence network.
“Since there is total collapse in the intelligence gathering of our country, which has forced us to become parasitic in America, we will like to use this medium to reiterate our call for the sacking of the NSA, all heads of Intelligence Agency and Departments and also the Service Chiefs under the leadership of the Chief of Defence Staff, Lt. General Lucky Irabor.
“In the interim, we wish to call on Buhari to temporarily relocate to either Kaduna or Katsina, since the men he entrusted with the security of the nation have proven to be grossly incompetent to secure the nation’s capital, pending when competent hands would take over from them.”
