A Non-Governmental Organisation, The Abuja School of Social and Political Thought ,TASSPT, has called for proactive measures to tackle terrorism in the West African sub-region.
Its Director, Dr Sam Amadi, made the call during a policy dialogue organised by the school in Abuja yesterday.
The theme of the dialogue was, “Appraising the success of counter-terrorism measures in the defence of democracy in West Africa”.
Amadi noted that although several counter-terrorism efforts were in place at different levels, terrorism activities seem to be spreading across the sub-region.
He stressed the need to pay more attention to insecurity due to its impact on livelihood and democracy.
“There are a lot of counter-terrorism measures at the level of states, national, regional and continental levels. The Africa Union ,AU, and the United Nations ,UN, are equally involved, yet they have not been very effective”, he said.
According to him, there is the need for the government to be proactive, engage stakeholders and develop capacity for persuasion and augmentation.
This, he said, would help rebuild the confidence of citizens in the state project.
“Government needs to develop a working state that has the capacity to aggregate ideas and commit citizens to a pursuit of the public good”, he said.
Amadi also emphasised the need for the Nigerian government to pay attention to aggrieved groups within the country so that they would not be recruited by terrorists within the region.
