Pioneer Nigerian astronaut Owolabi Salis has warned President Bola Tinubu that the insecurity situation in the country might worsen if decisive action is not taken.
Speaking via a statement, he urged both the president and his vice, Kashim Shettima, to take a cue from the late Chadian president, Idriss Derby, who personally led the battle against banditry during his lifetime.
He cautioned Tinubu not to wait until bandits attack the Aso Rock presidential villa before acting on the menace ravaging the country.
Salis appealed to the presidency to brace up with a sense of urgency for decisive and pragmatic measures to crush the banditry ravaging the country.
“Although I am not saying that the President and the Vice President should go out to the battlefront, what I am rather trying to commend unto them is the need to imbibe the monomaniac fury with which the late Chadian president tried to grapple with the knotty question of terrorism during his lifetime,” Salis said.
The Ikorodu-born Lagosian acknowledged the speculations by security experts warning of the possible escalation of terrorist insurgency as the dry season approaches.
“We should not wait until these dare-devil bandits overrun the country or even attack the Presidential Villa and the strategic Legislative bloc before it dawns on us that they really mean business,” he said.
Salis advocated an urgent need for Nigeria to evolve into a military superpower, armed to the teeth with sophisticated modern armaments that essentially inspire awe and a formidable presence in the global military arena.
He said that this is necessary in view of Nigeria’s natural demographic attribute, as it accommodates the largest number of blacks both in Africa and the diaspora.
Salis advised on the need to embark on massive recruitment into all arms of the military for sufficient numerical superiority, capable of responding with impregnable resilience and adroit competence to multifaceted areas of threat and protracted crises, as might possibly arise from time to time.
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