By Gloria Ikibah.
Nigeria’s Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives, and member of the Nigerian Delegation at Parliament of the Economic Community of West African States, Hon. Benjamin Okezie Kalu, had said the crises in the South-East region caused by the various agitations have drastically reduced.
Hon. Kalu credited the development to the new approach of non-kinetics adopted by the administration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, even as he said it is a paradigm shift from the norms.
Kalu stated this after the presentation of country report by Nigeria during plenary at the ongoing 2024 First Ordinary Season of the Sixth Legislature of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Parliament in Abuja.
According to him, the military has toned down their operations and have heeded the directive of President Tinubu in subscribing to the non kinetics means of settling the conflicts in the zone rather than wielding the guns.
He also revealed that this understanding has helped to restore tranquility in region and enabled the zone to appeal to the authorities to release the agitators who are in prison by activating a political solution.
Hon. Kalu further urged the sub-regional body to adopt the same measure in resolving similar issues, saying it is yielding positive results.
He said: “The usual tradition has been to send the military with their arms to crisis areas, to the battle of barrels of gun against barrels of gun. But there is a new wave now in my country where issues are being resolved without sending a military task force with guns. And it’s a non kinetic approach. It’s happening in my region, the southeastern region.
“Before his (President Bola Ahmed Tinubu) emergence, it was about Operation Crocodile, Operation Lion, Operation this and that. But through his initiative, he has been able to speak to the military, to look at sociological problems that remain the causative factors for the crisis and begin to look at ways of interpreting them and finding ways to bring the people to the table for resolution purposes. It’s a good template that Africa should actually absorb. ECOWAS should also look into..
“And it’s working in my region, the nerves that we are frayed before now, those who were agitating, the radicalized ones are beginning to see opportunities to look at non kinetic approaches towards resolving the conflict in the area. Remember I mentioned that my zone is the zone that suffered from the civil war.
So the pain is still there but the approach Mr President is using now is calming the tension there and it’s commendable.
“And we also hopeful that the region, through this non kinetic approach, also is reaching out to the administration to release some of the people who are in prison for the agitation for separation through non litigious ways. And it is working. My region is getting calmer than it used to be. So, it’s something that we must report.”